Most fascinating SUV of 2014: Toyota 4Runner TRD Pro

December, 10, 2014

In 2015, Toyota will begin shipping hydrogen-powered vehicles to select US showrooms.The 4Runner TRD Pro will not be among them.

Notwithstanding the Japan-only Toyota Land Cruiser 70 Series Anniversary Edition – a paragon of circa-1984 off-roading aesthetics and technology – there may be no more retrograde a vehicle introduced in 2014 than this special-edition SUV. Its sins are legion: body-on-frame construction, when nearly all new SUVs favour a quieter unibody setup; a five-speed automatic transmission, when a pint-size Jeep Renegade will give you nine forward ratios; blackened alloy wheels shod with knobby Nitto Terra Grappler tires, when most carmakers specify asphalt-friendly footwear for their beefier products. The 4Runner TRD Pro seems as concerned with fashion as the prehistoric rock it crawls over.

Maybe because its charms are timeless.Moving unconscionably fast over desert single-track comes as naturally to the 4Runner TRD Pro as shifting out of Park. Though machines like the Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT have more power and Land Rover LR4 more pedigree, Toyota 4x4s command their own cult of personality, and the 4Runner – sold in spurts over its 30-year history in European, Latin American and Asian markets as the Hilux Surf – is the flagship at the fore, kicking up a rooster tail of grime.

The 2015 TRD Pro version wears abbreviated approach and departure angles to avoid scrapes, up-rated shocks and springs, and the requisite special badging. Because the titular Toyota Racing Development has not tinkered under the hood, the 4Runner’s top-spec 4-litre V6 remains a truck engine through and through – prone to loud, Wet-Vac-like sound effects.

You might have gleaned that refinement is not the 4Runner TRD Pro’s strong suit. But whether approached as a time machine that delivers its driver to simpler pleasures, or a weekend antidote to workaday tedium, the TRD Pro is a hard-charging, tangerine-hued freedom fighter of the dirtiest order.

There is no shortage of aftermarket-enhanced Jeep Wranglers, most of them modified monstrosities with net doors, outsize wheels and million-candlepower light bars. The new Filson Edition of the Brute Double Cab, a four-door Wrangler pickup from American Expedition Vehicles, is not that sort of Jeep. Like everything else from the tweedy US-based outfitter, the Filson Edition Brute is one part square-jawed capability and one part soft-spoken civility. A 475-horsepower Hemi V8 engine supplies the power and 35in BFGoodrich Mud Terrain KM2 tires provides the traction. The body is available only in non-metallic dark green, and the seats wear fine brown Horween hide with tan twill inserts. And, of course, as with everything on the Filson site, from moleskin shirts to tin cloth bush hats, owning one of AEV’s $130,000 green machines is as simple as clicking “Add to Cart”. – Matthew Phenix

Most fascinating SUV of 2014: Toyota 4Runner TRD Pro

Latest News

Stock Market

Exchange Rates