If you want a more than capable SUV that is guaranteed to stand out from the crowd, no matter how popular a vehicle type it's becoming, then Mercedes has some very good news. The G550 4x4², an off-roader that stands 2.25-metre tall and 2.1 metres wide and with a ground clearance greater than the average toddler, is coming to America.

When it goes on sale in early 2017 don't expect to get much change from US $250,000 but do expect to get noticed, no matter where the road leads.

Related: Review: 2016 Mercedes-Benz G 550 disappoints on drivability and value

The car's gargantuan proportions are certain to attract attention but they're the result of fitting it with portal axles.

On a normal car and even on a normal SUV, the axles -- front and rear -- are perfectly in line with the centers of the wheels they drive, because the wheels are fitted to them and the axles to the engine via a transmission.

That means that ground clearance -- what you can drive over without hearing the sound of metal crunching and bending -- is dictated by wheel size and wheel size alone because that height dictates the level of the axle.

Even a monster truck has to use immense, oversized wheels to overcome this problem.

Axles and wheels being in line also reduces what the suspension can do in terms of how much or how far the body can move to overcome an obstacle.

Portal axles eradicate all of these problems by breaking this union. A series of gears send the power down from the axles above (at engine height) to the wheels below.

This remarkable piece of engineering means the car has a 51.6-degree approach and 43.8-degree departure angle (a normal G-Class can only manage 30 degrees) and a fording depth of 1 meter. It also means that for the uninitiated at least, it will seem like someone's allowed a monster truck on the road.

It won't quite have the grunt of Big Foot. The G550 4x4² will run on normal pump gas for starters and that fuel will be running through a 4-litre biturbo V8 engine good for 416hp and 450 lb-ft of torque that will run to all four wheels via a seven-speed automatic gearbox.

The car will also come with a satnav as standard, but with such an elevated driving position, owners should have no problem seeing the route ahead even without it.