Gear Patrol | Spirit of Adventure, Passion for Gear

Four Roar

American Expedition Vehicles has teased more information and photos of their highly anticipated AEV Brute Double Cab — which will officially launch at SEMA. The ruggedized monster appears to be a double helping of the original Brute launched back in 2002 and is based off the new JK wrangler frame. Inspired by the coveted Land [...]

Environmentally Insensitive

Looking like the illegitimate child of a flattened Humvee and an angry warthog, the Shadow Hawk Steel Hawk might also fit in nicely as the Tumbler’s stand-in during Gotham chase scenes. The Steel Hawk is powered by a 6.6 liter V8 engine with turbocharging that provides a healthy 360 horsepower and a meaty 650 pound [...]

The Sports Bus Has Arrived

Swamp Thing

The reimagined stock Toyota FJ can’t exactly hold a candle to the rough and rugged original that is still an icon in the SUV world and practically invented the term in the first place. That’s all changed with the XPLORE Adventure Series FJ Cruiser, a seriously beefed up version that essentially makes the FJ ready [...]

Roam On the Range, Or Anywhere Else You Damn Please

The Merecedes Benz G-Wagon LAPV 6.X and the Icon CJ3B definitely have off-roading capabilities in spades, but they certainly don’t have a Loftop with 9 feet of interior stand up height, a queen-size bed, a 25 gallon fresh water capacity, a toilet, shower, sink, cooking facilities, and a solar-powered fridge. In case you were wondering [...]

Redefining Hot Ride

After Land Rover updated the Range Rover Sport , the car specialists at Project Kahn decided to follow suit with their lava-inspired Vesuvius edition. The new iteration features an orange and black aero package that’s matched by the SUV’s custom quilted and perforated leather interior, proving that Kahn Designs clearly had Gear Patrol in mind [...]

Beefier and Leaner

The 2010 BMW X3 is about to pass the baton to the long-awaited X3 redesign for the 2011 model year. The first-generation X3 spearheaded the way for the near-luxury mid-sized SUV category in 2004 and spawned a wave of similar vehicles, like the Acura RDX and the Audi Q5. The X3 is labeled an “SAV” [...]

The 5th Generation of One Glorious SUV

If you happened to be a loyal Gear Patrol fan browsing last week in between feasting, you might have a seen a brief video of yours truly and our resident car reviewer Bradley Hasemeyer experiencing the non-casino side of Vegas. Well besides using our time to toy with death, we also had some extended sessions [...]

The G-Wagon turns 30 and gets a ridiculous price tag. I still want one.

People who buy Mercedes Geländewagens are often (for the worse) categorized as soccer moms or as guys who don’t care about money. There are a select few, though, that buy them for the reasons G-Wagens were originally conceived: quality off-road vehicles intended for the military (see: Land Rover Defender). The profile of the G-Wagen is [...]

An SUV Worth Its Salt Lets turn back a little over one decade ago to 1997. A year when men were mired in news about Princess Diana’s passing, cloned sheep, and photos beamed from Mars. Oh, and Land Rover would be forced to stop selling the Land Rover Defender due to airbag regulations. Most of [...]

Sorry, You Can’t Get One Jeep J8 Heavy Duty. Grrrrr…. The Jeep J8 Heavy Duty. Further evidence that great vehicles don’t always make it to the United States. A diesel powered Jeep makes sense. Not just because diesel vehicles are fantastic and efficient, but the notion that a heavy-duty Jeep would answer the calls and [...]

19 Years Old, 64,000 Miles, And Pretty Damn Perfect I’d trade in a Land Rover for a Jeep Wagoneer anyday. If you haven’t gathered, the GP team works hard to bring unique products you don’t see rehashed across every website or blog from here to the end of the web. From time to time, we [...]

Someone’s Finally Getting The Crossover Right This ain’t no Coupe De’Ville   [click on image to enlarge] When it comes to Cadillac’s Science & Technology design scheme it’s either love it or hate it. But the men in Detroit are definitely finding a rhythm, what with the 2009 Cadillac CTS-V and Cadillac CTS Coupe Concept. For [...]

[click on image to enlarge] When you think of a “hybrid” do you immediately think of an exorbitantly priced underpowered vehicle with questionable styling? Do you also think that with today’s gas prices and fuel uncertainty a hybrid vehicle is becoming an ever more viable option? Now, when you think of a Chevy Tahoe do [...]

Evidently the Germans at Porsche HQ have been reading Gear Patrol because they’ve created what appears to be our new spokesvehicle. The Cayenne S Transsyberia. Taking an otherwise staid vehicle and turning it into something I doubt anyone would have imagined coming from the Deutschland factories. Equipped with a 385 horsepower V-8, permanent all wheel [...]