There’s been backroom and anonymously-sourced talk about the Dodge Durango becoming a three-row SUV called the Dodge Stealth for years. With a new report on the matter from Motor Trend‘s Alisa Priddle, the transition is practically fact. The story goes that the resurrection of another name from Dodge’s past will debut at the end of 2024 for the 2025 model year. The platform is still a mystery. The first option would be keeping Dodge’s family bus twinned with the Jeep Grand Cherokee as the model’s historically been, and using the Grand Cherokee’s new WL architecture. The second option would be putting the Stealth on the Stellantis STLA Large platform that offers hybrid accommodations and modular battery-electric powertrains. During Stellantis’ EV Day in 2021, a slide showed the STLA Large set aside for “AWD Performance” and “American Muscle.” This use case is already known to include use for coming Dodge muscle cars, it makes just as much sense for the platform to serve a Dodge SUV.
MT writes the twin-turbo 3.0-liter Hurricane inline-six is going to get a role as well, likely with electric assistance. We might see a preview of a hybrid Stealth powertrain when the Jeep Wagoneer 4xe debuts sometime in 2024.
At dealer meetings earlier this year, unnamed sources said the three-row Stealth would come in a “drastically different” than the Durango, more along the lines of “what people are looking for.”
The same MT report dovetails with rumors from years ago that the Durango name could go further up the SUV food chain. In 2021, anonymous sources told Mopar Insiders a new-generation Durango would give up its unibody ways to go body-on-frame, built at the same Warren Truck Assembly plant that produces the body-on-frame Jeep Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer. The Durango would be the more mainstream take, a challenger to the Chevrolet Tahoe with tons of space and heaps of towing capacity. MT writes, “The Durango name may yet live on, as it could be reinvented as a larger body-on-frame SUV that shares the Jeep Wagoneer platform.”
We’ll see the Stealth first, the anticipated starting price around $40,000.
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