Jeep Wrangler EcoDiesel spied ahead of official production

The bright red Jeep Wrangler Unlimited you see up above might not look particularly noteworthy at first glance. Look closer, though, and you'll see one very important letter on the tailgate. The 3.0 D badging indicates that this particular prototype is powered by Fiat Chrysler's 3.0-liter EcoDiesel engine.

The turbocharged V6 is expected to produce something in the vicinity of 260 horsepower and 442 pound-feet of torque – the same as it should produce in the Ram 1500 and Jeep Gladiator pickup trucks. It will be mated exclusively to an eight-speed automatic transmission, and, naturally, it'll send all that torquey goodness to all four wheels.

Now that prototypes have been spotted in the wild sans any sort of camouflage, we'd expect an official debut to happen pretty quickly, hopefully along with information on pricing and fuel efficiency. Production ought to commence before the end of the year.