Jeep Wrangler vs Jayco Hawk

What's the difference?

The changes to this updated Jeep Wrangler are small but meaningful. The inclusion of airbags, the updated media screen, and a feisty engine which suits the plucky nature of this off-roader make it a better Wrangler than ever.  

Note: CarsGuide attended this event as a guest of the manufacturer, with travel, accommodation and meals provided.

The Jayco Hawk Outback is a solid, feature-packed camper-trailer without being flash about it. It looks good – checker plate is always a nice touch – and it is easy to tow and set up. Sure, it may not be as gung-ho an off-road unit as its name suggests, but it is more than capable of handling gravel or dirt tracks on the way to your campsite and will be a comfortable camper when you actually arrive there.

When we review most SUVs practicality is scored on things like legroom, storage space and boot size. But in the case of a vehicle with removable doors and roof, and a cabin that has one-way drainage valves so you can hose the interior out, practicality takes on a different meaning.

The Wrangler’s practicality seems focussed on serving adventurous folks in search of a muddy off-road expedition and, so, while there is storage it’s mainly nets for door pockets, moulded wells on top of the dash, and smaller hidey holes to makes sure loose items don’t get flung around the cabin.

Given the roof can be removed there’s also a lockable glove box and centre console storage box.

When it comes to cabin space the Wrangler’s interior feels a bit cramped. The footwells up front don’t offer much space and headroom throughout is restricted by the roll cage which stretches from the front to the boot.

The four-door Wrangler has five seats and good legroom in the second row, even for me at 189cm tall. As mentioned above, headroom is limited in places because of the safety structure. Boot space behind those rear seats is 898 litres.

The two-door Rubicon has four seats. The back ones aren’t the most spacious and the boot behind them is almost too small to mention at 365L, Two pieces of carry-on luggage wouldn’t fit back there and we had to put our bags on the rear seats.

The rear tailgate for all Wranglers is side-hinged (opening left to right) and splits to allow just the window section or lower part to open separately.

For charging and powering devices all Wranglers have two USB ports up front (one -A and one -C) and four USB ports in the second row (two -A and two -C). There are also two 12V outlets on board (front and rear).  

There are two cupholders, seatback map nets and directional air vents for the second row.

The Wrangler sits high and climbing into the rear seats might be a challenge for smaller kids or even fully-grown humans, but there are chunky handholds at the pillars for extra help.

So, the Wrangler has excellent practicality, but this is geared more to its intended purpose of adventuring off-road rather than the city commute and school pick-up.

Jayco camper-trailers have a nice touring-friendly floor-plan but where the Hawk Outback deviates from the line-up norm is that its kitchen is positioned to the left of the door as you step inside, rather than in front and to the right of you as you step inside on other models.

The interior height tops out at 2070mm high – pretty standard for these campers – and inside is roomy enough not to feel like a confined space, although it will get squeezy if all four adults and two kids are in here and milling about at the same time.

Looking from the door, to the left is the four-burner stove, then, as you look to the front, the extended lift-up bed and storage, and, swiveling to your right, the Dometic 95-litre fridge (Touring models get the 90-litre fridge), then stainless-steel sink, dinette seat, table, club lounge, double bed, then TV cabinet.

Drawers are all Ezi glide pull-out style. The pop-in/pop-out button on each handle – to lock it in place and unlock it – is generally a good system but can be prone to becoming fiddly, even sticking. This is a minor problem and can be found in many campers with a similar mechanism on their drawers.

Interior lighting includes overhead LEDs for the main area and reading lights for the beds. There’s a fan for the beds.

Every one of the Jeep launches I’ve attended over the past 15 years has involved a pretty decent off-road component and it’s clear the company has a lot of faith in its product.

This Wrangler launch’s off-road test had been scaled back due to days of flooding rain beforehand, but the section that was passable was enough to remind us of what we already know and that is the Wrangler is formidable.

A Queensland bush off-road course full of steep, muddy hills, ruts, rocks, dirt and slippery descents was still all there for us to test the Wrangler Rubicon four-door.

Fun and comfortable are the first words that pop into my head when recalling how the Rubicon fares. This is a super-capable beastie that feels planted, secure and adept at all times.

We tested low- and high-range four-wheel drive, locked the rear differential and let the hill descent mode do its thing and get us down the sides of hills that felt so close to vertical all we could see through the windscreen was the ground.

What's also clear is the new turbo-petrol, four-cylinder feels well suited to the job, with plenty of torque along with a feisty and responsive nature that fits the Wrangler better than the old V6.

There was also plenty of time spent on the road in the four-door Rubicon and its smaller two-door sibling. And was here it was also super clear the Wrangler felt like we’d taken it out of its natural habitat.

At 110km/h on the motorway the two door Rubicon feels light and floaty in its suspension, with steering adjustments having to be made constantly, like actors pretending to drive cars in movies, as the Wrangler wanders around in its lane. The Wrangler wander is a known trait and isn’t specific to this updated car. 

And even though our launch drive took us on some great winding country roads which would have been perfect for a Mazda MX-5, the Wranglers found the fast tight turns difficult to handle.

I’m sure I heard a sigh of relief from our Rubicon as we pulled off the road and selected low-range four-wheel drive before bouncing up what looked to be a sheer cliff, with ease.  

Of course, our Adventure Expert Marcus 'Crafty' Craft will put the Wrangler though its paces once we have one in the CarsGuide garage.

Because of its compact size – especially relative to caravans which are, by their very nature, generally bigger and bulkier than camper-trailers – the Hawk Outback is a very easy thing tow as it sits low and stable on all surfaces and well within the confines of even narrower bush tracks.

The single-axle camper – 5060mm long (including drawbar), 1910mm high, 2240mm wide, and with a 1285kg tare weight – hardly registered behind our tow vehicle, a 2019 Ford Everest, with the new 2.0-litre four-cylinder bi-turbo-diesel engine (157kW/500Nm).

It always felt secure on the towball (with a 145kg download) during highway, gravel track and undulating dirt-road driving.

The Hawk Outback, like other Outbacks, has a hot dip galvanised Endurance chassis on Jayco’s JTech coil-spring suspension set-up. (Note: Jayco’s Outback models are designed and engineered for, at worst, dirt roads and gravel roads, not 4WD tracks. They are not built for hard-core off-roading.)

Another bonus: visibility is clear and open along both of its sides and even over the top – no need for towing mirrors here.