Ford Explorer Tremor vs Hyundai Palisade XRT vs Tombstone Hill - Which Is BEST Off-Road?

Hey Tommy, we've got two brand new family haulers that are also off-roaders going up against Tombstone Hill. That's right, we've got the new Hyundai Palisade XRT Pro and the Ford Explorer Tremor, and we're going to find out in today's video, are these more than just painting colors? We've got to put these things to the test in the real world. Let's go hit it. Guys, we're not fooling around here. Tombstone Hill is a serious test of off-roadability. To my left is Truth, which is loose and gravelly and really uses all of the vehicle's all-wheel or four-wheel drive system. And to my right is Dare, which is loose and gravelly and steep and full of big boulders, which will really test these vehicles because they, well, might not have enough ground clearance for either of these hills. We're out here on Tombstone Hill, which is a spur of the Switzerland Trail, and the great thing about OnX OffRoad today's sponsor is if you don't have a built-out Wrangler or Bronco, you can still find the best trails in your area for your Hyundai or Ford Explorer, so you can tackle some easier stuff that you know you're not going to get stuck out on the trail. So this first climb here, big transition, and this trick rear diff is doing its thing. This electronic limited slip diff works really well. Look how easily we're crawling up this here. You know, in the past, both Hyundai and Kia, which are basically the same company, have used dual-clutch transmissions, which has not been ideal for off-roading. No, definitely not, but this Palisade's got a naturally aspirated V6 and it's got a torque converter eight-speed automatic. And let me make sure I'm locked into first gear. The torque is surprisingly good, so even though we don't have a low range, it's geared pretty short and first to the point where we're not really building any major heat in either the engine or the trans. Yeah, it made easy work of truth. I gotta tell you, I'm impressed. Yeah, so I feel like in both the Santa Cruz I just tested, but specifically in this Palisade, Hyundai has totally revamped their all-wheel drive system programming. It used to be incredibly underwhelming, and now it is perfectly whelming. It is actually very good. They've done a really good job in distributing torque. Are you saying it's overwhelming? No, perfectly whelming. I'm whelmed to the right amount. Did you see that? Like, almost no slip. We were picking up tires there, and it just crawled right up it. We've been running this hill for a number of years, and that was one of the easiest truth ascents we've ever done. Are you going to use hill descent? I am, yep. So I've got it activated here. Yep. It's going too fast, though. It's going way too fast. Way too fast. Can I adjust the speed here? Yeah. Oh, there we go. There you go. That's better. I used the pedal to set it at essentially two miles an hour. That's now foot completely off the brake, locked into first gear, and the Hyundai is doing what it needs to do. What's our pitch at here, Dad? Our pitch is at, well, it rolls at six percent. I can't. Fifteen. Oh, it's red. Sixteen. That's pretty good for a little hill. Not bad. Yeah, I mean, let's face it, Tommy. Not a lot of people are going to be doing even this kind of off-roading with this vehicle, right? This is going to serve as the family truckster for a lot of folk. Uh-huh. So you're going to pick up the kids, get grandma. Yep. And probably not going to be out here doing Tombstone Hill, but if you do, just go to Onyx, and we'll tell you how to get here. Yeah, for sure. And this thing is doing so well. Like I said, the difference that a couple years makes with what Hyundai and Kia have done to their all-wheel drive systems is incredible. So, Tommy, we're in the Explorer now, and at $64,000, this car is $13,000 more expensive than that $51,000 Hyundai. And is that because it's got two more turbos and two more cylinders? Yeah, I think that certainly has something to do with it. Look, you can get a Tremor Explorer for about $50,000, just like that Hyundai, but it's going to have the 2.3-liter four-cylinder. This one's got the ST engine, so three-liter twin-turbo V6, 400 horsepower. Yeah, 100 horsepower, over 100 horsepower more. So I've got into the off-road mode here, which pulls up the cameras. And we're stuck already. Well, I got to power up it a little bit. So this uses a Torsen limited-slip rear differential. The same one that's on the Raptor. Well, it used to be. Raptor used to have a front Torsen. Yeah, exactly. But this is a rear Torsen. We're getting a little bit stuck here. I'm keeping constant throttle pressure. Interesting. Interesting. It's struggling a little bit more. I found that what we're finding here is that the Hyundai all-wheel drive system is a little bit more sophisticated in its approach. This Ford system is a little bit more ham-fisted in how it pulls us up here. Not that long ago, you did a slip test, a control test on these all-wheel drive systems. If people want to see that, they can go to alt.fl and find it. And let's just include a little bit of footage now so people can see what that looks like. Definitely feel that traction control working now. Yeah, okay. So a little quicker for sure pulled us down. So pretty good results in the Explorer, I got to say. It's not quite as immediate maybe as the Hyundai, but if you commit to getting those turbos just a little bit spooled up, get some torque applied, built up into the all-wheel drive system. Very good. Very, very good indeed. So what I find like this Explorer does is it kind of uses brute force to pound its way up things. And listen, it does it, right? When you've got that much power underneath the hood, you can really get away with a lot of stuff. I'm not saying it's the correct way to do it, but this is such a rocket ship in comparison to that Palisade. So we're going down the hill. I do have hill descent control. Already activated. That's a great question. Where do they hide the little button? Yeah, I don't see the little hill descent. Maybe it's- Oh, because they put it in the screen. Is it in the screen? Yeah, everything in the Ford is in the screen here. Hill descent control. There you go. You got it. I much prefer having buttons, but there we go. Hill descent is on. We also- If you're wondering what hill descent is for all of you who are new to off-roading, which you might be, because this is kind of a new segment, these three-row off-roaders. I guess the Suburban and the Tahoe. But anyway, it's basically off-road cruise control. Sort of, yeah. It helps you maintain a constant speed going down steep hills, so you can focus on steering instead of braking. The Ford hill descent control is really, really good. Very minute adjustments you can make to the speed using the brake pedal. So you use a brake pedal, you set the speed, and then you take your foot off the brake, it holds that speed. And you can see we are just cruising. This thing also has more of an off-road tuned suspension compared to the standard Explorers. How do you think the ride quality is compared to the Palisade? It feels more off-road worthy, if that makes sense. It feels like it's a little bit more set up for off-roading. It's what I'm used to. The Palisade feels a little softer, which in terms of head bob is better, but in terms of control, you would know that better. Yeah, I disagree. I think actually, in terms of damping, the Ford does a better job at it. I think that the wheel travels probably a little better in the Ford just sitting behind the wheel here. It feels like it's conforming to the ground maybe a little bit better, but they're both pretty similar. 8.4 versus this is 8.7 inches of ground clearance. Off-road, what you want is for the suspension to keep the tires in contact with the dirt. Yeah, exactly. If they got up in the air, then you're basically losing traction. What I do love about this Ford, though, is we've got significantly more underbody protection, so I'm less worried about the pointy rocks as I drive along here. If we hear some bad scrapey sounds, I'm like, ah, it was designed for it, where the Hyundai, we have that front bash plate and that's pretty much it. Here's the deal. Apparently, you guys want more than just three rows of family hauling. You want a vehicle that is rugged and ready to go off-road, and that's what Hyundai has done with this new Palisade XRT. The XRT Pro means that it has all the off-road bits, including, like I said, the recovery hooks, these cross-contact ATs, and get this, not zero, but one skid plate. But what it doesn't have, and what's going to make it difficult, is it doesn't have a low range. The Ford Explorer Tremor has three skid plates, two turbos, and 10 speeds in its transmission, so a lot of big numbers in this three-row crossover. Plus, it's got recovery points, it's got orange accents on the wheels, but more importantly, it's got Bridgestone Dueler off-road tires and slightly more ground clearance than that Hyundai, so it should perform a little better out here, at least on paper. Now, I have to say, I'm getting a little nervous about Dare, specifically because of the lack of both ground clearance and approach and departure angles. You can take out a spoiler on this part. So, this car has the optional, when I went on the program, it was still in prototype development, and I'm not totally sure it's been fully released to the public yet, but this car has it, which is an underbody front guard for the nose, but we're still pretty exposed for the rest of the underside, like the engine still kind of has a plastic covering, nothing really on the fuel tank, so this might be a little bit tricky, considering we only have 8.4 inches of ground clearance. Yeah, which isn't exactly enough for… Crawling. Yeah, and over the years, Dare has also gotten much harder. Yes, and it's gotten so chewed out, but I gotta say, they've really upped their performance to the point where I hope we can get up it then. Yeah, I see those rocks, and I see those pointy boulders. Let me know if you need a spot, because it has gotten so much worse. It's all covered in shade, too, which makes it look so much more boring than it really is. Yeah, we're doing pretty hardcore off-roading here, but the camera, of course, flattens everything out, making it seem like we're not, but we are. So, that's two wheels. And we're not moving already. We're already stuck. No, we're going. All right, I figured it out. There it goes. You know, the scary part is when it finally goes, it takes off real quick. Well, that's why you want a low range. Yeah, that's the problem, isn't it? We don't have. Yeah, so you get this kind of stutter effect, because you're trying to control your speed with the brake, which is never great. Well, look, it's doing it, though. I cannot believe it. I'm just waiting for a big… That's nearly 20 degrees, and it is crawling. Oh, yes, Hyundai. I am using pretty much half to full throttle here, and I've let off a little bit there. Come on, figure it out. Oh, now it's full throttle. This is where we need a low range. Come on, come on. Now it's stuck. Come on. That's good. There we go. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I think we're going to do it. You know, Tommy, I'm not sure if that was a car or your driving skill. That was all the car. Or a little bit of both. But that was very impressive. Yeah, and even with 8.4 inches, we didn't touch the underside at all. And there's other things that make this, you know, a little bit more challenging off-road. People forget that big and heavy is not great for off-road, just like a racetrack, right? Sure. You don't ever want to have big, heavy cars, and both of these are big and heavy, yeah. But I got to say, that was not a bad performance. Yeah, I wouldn't go down there. No, I don't think it's worth it. We're not going to prove anything. Except that we can damage a press car. Now, look, limited suspension travel in this Hyundai. Fairly limited torque to only 260 pound-feet of torque. And we were definitely feeling that going up there. I mean, I was foot to the floor for parts of it, when the traction control was just trying to figure out what to do. Trans temp got up to 230. You want to show this? Yeah, so this is what Tommy was talking about right there. So we're definitely kind of approaching the upper end of the scale, but we're still in the green. We're not off the edge there. And then if I go here, this is my favorite view. Look at that. Those are those cameras. Oh, look at that. Look at all that information. I saw that transparent hood where you see the ground in front of you. First time on a Land Rover, believe it or not. I know. I guess that makes sense. But that is good information. I don't know. What are those lines? So this shows you your suspension travel. So this kind of shows you what your articulation is doing. Those little three dots there, that's going to be kind of how your four-wheel drive system is reacting, how much it's locked up. Maybe a little too small. Yeah, a little too much information. But I mean, come on. Like, this is pretty good information to have in a Hyundai three-row. I gotta say, I'm pretty happy with that information. Now, you took kind of the right side of there. We took the left side. The left side, I mean. Yep. So you're going to do the same line. Same exact line. We got to keep it fair. I'm going to make sure this Ford is locked in the first gear. So the Ford system is slow to respond, but when it kicks in, it is pretty aggressive. And the torque is very good. So, like, one thing I'm noticing, I'm using a lot less throttle here. And part of that, I think, is down to gearing. When I lock this thing down into the first gear on this 10-speed automatic, it's just a little bit better setup for crawlers. Does first gear act kind of like a granny gear to give you a little bit more control? All right, let's see if you have the clearance. They did redesign the front bumper on the Tremor compared to the standard Explorer for a few degrees of extra approach angle. Now, traditional transmission, once again, torque converter, which is great for off-road. Yep, no low range in this one either. A little bit of that shooting up the hill once it figures it out. That's the result of not having a crawler low range, right? But once again, I think that... Oh, here we go. This is going to get interesting. Oh, there we go. Figured it out. Yep. So what I'm noticing is, like, in these areas in the Hyundai, I was full throttle, right? Trying to get up this detraction control, really working hard. In this thing, I may be a throttle. And I think that's, like I said, a result of that lower first gear and just the crazy torque out of this twin-turbo V6. The other thing I would say is, with the Ford, there was a sense that you could tell when it was figuring it out. Whereas with the Hyundai, it was like full, full, full. And then, boom, it just shot up. So there was no sense of, like, okay, it's slowly figuring it out. It's going to slowly crawl you over the rock. It was just like, can't figure out. Oh, I got it. Boom. Sure. Yeah, I can see that. That's sitting in the passenger seat. That's what it felt like. I'm conflicted. Because I think, in terms of traction control power distribution, something that Jeep calls brake-lock differentials, right? Right. The Hyundai is better. I think that it's smoother to activate and more consistent. But from a powertrain standpoint, I think the Ford is better, just because it's got so much low-end grunt. So the perfect solution would be this engine with that all-wheel drive system. Okay. So that's the best solution here. Because I think that all-wheel drive system is actually better. All right, Tommy, I got to say, I was nervous coming up here because I thought we would do some potential damage. But both of these vehicles did really well. Yeah, they both rocked it. But I got to say, I've been doing some thinking about it. I'm going to give the win to the Ford. Really? I was going to give it to the Hyundai. Well, the reason I'm giving it to the Ford is because at no point did I ever have to go more than, like, a quarter throttle. So I felt like there was a lot more to go in terms of what this thing could climb. Whereas even though that all-wheel drive system was incredible, especially on Dare, I was pretty much matted. And the thing was really working hard. All right, well, I'll give this the most improved. Oh, for sure. Yeah, Hyundai, what they've done from last year to this year is mind-blowing. And give them one more year, they're going to be doing some really cool stuff in the off-road space, I think. My issue with the Ford is at $64,000, Tommy, I would much rather have a truck-based three-row. So at that point, give me a Tahoe or give me something that's got a truck underneath it and a low range. And then, you know, this will be a piece of cake. Well, let us know what you guys think in the comment section below. As always, this is Roman saying head on over to alltfl.com for more news, views, and of course, Tommy's slip test reviews. We'll see you next time. Ciao.