By Doron Levin
That noise you hear is the sound of grinding molars. It's coming from Chrysler's headquarters in Auburn Hills, Mich. and the offices of Jeep retail dealers across the U.S., who are champing at the bit to start selling the new Jeep Cherokee.
The new Cherokee compact sport utility vehicle is a critically important model for Chrysler, which is recuperating from its 2009 bankruptcy filing. Chrysler has built more than 12,000 Cherokees at its Toledo, Ohio Jeep plant but can't release them for sale until glitches with its transmission are resolved.
According to Chrysler, engineers are refining the nine-speed automatic transmission featured on the vehicle, the first of its kind on any Chrysler vehicle. Once the refinements are complete, the electronics of existing transmissions must be reprogrammed.
Jeep is Chrysler's most valuable brand, among Dodge, Chrysler, Fiat, and Ram Truck. The Liberty had previously served as Jeep's compact SUV offering, which includes competitors like the hot-selling Honda CR-V (HMC), Ford (F) Escape, and Toyota (TM) RAV4. Over two generations of Liberty, sales peaked in 2002 at 171,212; they fell to a trough of 43,503 in 2009.
Chrysler's Toledo assembly plant was shut down last fall for retooling, in anticipation of the spring startup of production. The automaker displayed the new Cherokee at the New York auto show in late March. Press drives of the car were postponed to September from August due to difficulties with the transmission, which is based on a design by the German manufacturer ZF and built at a Chrysler plant in Indiana
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