This isn’t what you think: what you’re looking at is a Diesel-powered HD Jeep Gladiator, and it’s bleeding massive!
This diesel-powered HE Jeep Gladiator is not what you might be thinking. No, it’s not a Gladiator sitting on huge axles, nor is it a Gladiator that received a 6.7-liter Cummins. Nope, this is the mating of a Ram 2500 platform and running gear, with parts of a Jeep Gladiator. It’s not the other way around, and you can tell when you see it’s ridiculous size.
Recently Andre got to check out this beast at the 2023 SEMA show in Las Vegas, and it was a huge highlight for him. From a distance, the vehicle sure looks like a beefed-up Gladiator. Things change when you take a closer look. All of the exterior components had to be stretched in order to fit on this heavy-duty platform, including the hood. In this case, two Gladiator hoods were cut, additional metal was fitted and they were fabricated to look like a scaled-up version of the same hood.
Something as simple as the front windshield had to be custom-made. The interior is a mix of Ram seating, Katzkin covering and Jeep esthetics. Despite the look, the entire dash is custom-made out of fiberglass to fit properly.
If we could only have a diesel-powered HD Jeep Gladiator…
The bed is completely custom fabricated as well. Jon wanted to use the wasted space in pickup truck beds for additional storage. Thus, he rigged a trick opening (linear actuator) side component that revealed a ton of storage. While it looks like a Gladiator bed, the bed floor is actually out of the Ram HD. The rest was fabricated. A lot of it looks factory.
Even the six-piece hardtop is custom-made and works a lot like a regular removable Jeep hardtop.
There is a lot more to unpack in this video. Check it out!
