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>Which Hummer is Right for You?
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Drive a Hummer and you are guaranteed to stand out from the crowd. But unless you are a serious off-road-driving enthusiast, are there really any down-to-earth reasons to own one?

Forget about fuel economy or the ability to fit into tight parking spaces - such standard features were left in the back seat at the Hummer's design stage. With price tags of about $145,000 for the H1 and $60,000 for the H2, the big Hummers have well-deserved reputations for being stylish toys for those wealthy enough to afford them.

But that could be changing. In 2005, General Motors (GM) introduced the H3, the smallest model in its Hummer line. With a list price of about $30,000 - about half the price of the larger H2 - the H3 seems positioned to be the Hummer for the rest of us. And early indications are that this may be the case: In February, Hummer sales doubled compared to the previous year, largely driven by demand for the H3. Even more auspiciously, the sales increase came at a time when overall GM's sales were decreasing by 2.5 percent.

According to a February article in Business Week Online, GM sells about 60,000 Hummers each year, mostly to buyers who have never purchased a GM product before. People who buy Hummers tend to be younger and wealthier than traditional buyers of other GM cars. According to Dayna Hart, manager of Hummer Communications in Detroit, about 40 percent of the buyers of the mid-size H3s are women, compared with 20 percent for the H2.
A common concern among those who purchase H3s is family safety, but fuel economy also could be on their minds. At 19 mpg on the highway, the H3 gets about the same gas mileage as the Jeep Grand Cherokee (see Which Hummer Is Right for You?).

Even so, the appeal of Hummers continues to be about image. A Hummer dealer in Alaska, for example, recently sent an e-mail to prospective buyers that read: "Have you noticed that almost all the vehicles that you see on the road today all look alike? Think about it; have you ever seen when some person pulls the labels and decals off the exterior of their car -you cannot tell them apart. Hummer buyers are tired of being like the Joneses - they want to be different [and] enjoy the technology and unique design that sets Hummer [apart] from the ordinary."

Ed Hellwig, senior road test editor at Edmunds.com, thinks the brand image of the bigger Hummers carries over to the H3. "Regardless of the model, Hummers appeal to people who want to get noticed or who don't mind standing out. Obviously with the styling of all three models, it's one of the few vehicles of the road that is a big standout - nothing else looks like it," he says.

Hellwig says the H3 is probably one of the best SUVs in terms off-road capability. "Suspension, ground clearance, approach angles. Regardless of whether people think it's as [durable] as the bigger models, it still does have that ability. It climbs some pretty impressive trails. It's one of the top vehicles in terms of off-road ability. That's certainly something that was brought down from the bigger models."

But not everyone who buys an H3 plans to take it off-road. Notes Hellwig: "If you look at H1 owners, they see the off-road aspect as very central to the ownership of the vehicle. For the H3, it's probably typical of most SUVs, which is a low percentage. Maybe 10 percent actually use them for serious off-roading, as opposed to going up in the mountains to go skiing."

And even among serious off-roaders, not all drivers see an H3 in their future. Ren Bernier, a Jeep historian, of Owl's Head, Maine, who has driven a military Humvee off-road, does not think there is any reason to own an H3, even in Maine. "A more sensibly priced 4x4 pickup truck with a plow seems more practical," says Bernier.

Military family ties

Recognition of the Hummer brand is based largely on its distinctive boxy shape, which is derived from its prototype, the military Humvee. Randy Withrow, director of the Veteran's Memorial Museum in Huntsville, Ala., says the boxy design of the original Humvee was entirely functional and that style had nothing to do with it. "To my knowledge, there is or was no requirement for the box. Utility was the requirement: function, not appearance. There was no need for pretty curves or designs that are pleasing to the eye. There were, however, requirements for weight and profile for shipping on aircraft - besides other military requirements," he says.

Actually, the Humvee's boxy shape is reminiscent of much earlier military transport designs. When designers first began converting cars into trucks, they were faced with the task of maximizing transport efficiency on a rectangular wheelbase. A consequence of this constraint was the functional, boxy shape.

By some stretch of the imagination, military boxiness could be traced back even earlier. During the American Civil War, for example, the Union Army began constructing ironclad railroad cars that were essentially armored boxcars. Light artillery pieces could be fired from these cars, supplemented by small arms fired through apertures cut in their sides.

Interestingly, the motor vehicle was rather slow to be adopted by the Army. Old-timers in the cavalry tended to prefer their horses. Also, in the late 19th century, few motor vehicles could handle unsurfaced terrain. According to military vehicle historian David Lockard of York Springs, Pa., the Army had fewer than 20 trucks as late as 1912.

Lockard points out that one of the earliest four-wheel drive vehicles used by the Army was the Nash Quad. Originally manufactured in 1914, the boxy Quad proved well-suited for unpaved roads. It was effectively deployed during World War I by armed forces in Russia, France, Britain, and the United States, making it perhaps the closest forebear of the modern Hummer.

During World War II, recognizing the need for a small, general-purpose, four-wheel-drive vehicle, the U.S. Ordnance Department released bid invitations for a light car to pull the 37 mm antitank gun and carry its crew. The response was the military jeep, which was first produced by Bantam, and later by Willys and Ford.

Ken Coanshock, a military jeep enthusiast from Carteret, N.J., thinks the jeep's boxy shape reflected ease of manufacture. "Body panels was the first area they tried to shave weight. They took the bare-bones approach and designed panels with simple straight bends and used as little metal as possible. This design was much easier and cheaper to produce since simple tooling was needed. Otherwise it may have taken months or even a year to set up a factory with new tooling to produce a complicated body style," he says.

But Bernier notes that the jeep's boxy shape also accommodated mounted accessories and gear. Bernier points out that height, length, and weight restrictions aimed at limiting the jeep's silhouette on the battlefield and facilitating its transport in aircraft also contributed to its design.

Another useful design element, according to Bernier, is the flat hood, which quickly was recognized for its potential as a useful work surface and cargo tie-down area in the prototype vehicle and so was incorporated in the three follow-up designs (manufactured as the Bantam BRC40, Willys MA, and Ford GP).

A major drawback associated with the boxy jeep, however, was that large weapons could not be mounted on it - recoil from the weapons tended to flip it over. Use of the jeep was therefore normally limited to transporting the weapon system from one place to another.

The need for a more stable vehicle eventually gave rise to the Humvee. According to Bill Benson of the Military Vehicle Collectors Club in Spokane, Wash., "The difference between the Humvee and the vehicles that came before it is the wheelbase and width of the vehicle. The Humvee was the first of the smaller general-purpose vehicles designed to provide a stable weapons platform from which large-caliber automatic weapons could be deployed while the vehicle was in motion."

Edmunds.com's Hellwig thinks the civilian Hummer's military origins have contributed to its popularity. "Hummers are not the only vehicle that has a military heritage," he says. "The Mercedes G500 is a luxury vehicle that was originally - and still is today - a military vehicle. It has very boxy styling. If a vehicle is even derived just a little bit from the military, that's better than, say, a Toyota that was strictly built for driving on the street."

Of course, not all boxy vehicles currently on the U.S. market have military origins. The squared-off Honda Element, for example, was designed to maximize the amount of available cargo space that could be accommodated by a small footprint. And the Land Rover LR3 was made even boxier to give it more interior space - same with the Jeep Commander. But the Hummer's boxiness, like its size, seems to have more to do with its heritage and brand image than with functionality.

"As you go down the line to the H3, people probably realize it has not a lot to do with the original H1. I think there is still the idea that if it's a Hummer, it's going to have some of that H1 heritage built into it. It's just a little bit of something in the back of peoples' minds. I think that's still on the minds of people who drive the H3 or are thinking about buying it," he adds.

But Steve Diller, coauthor of Making Meaning (New Riders, 2006), thinks Hummer has stretched its brand image far beyond its military origins. Diller suggests that the big cars might appeal to those seeking a sense of security in an increasingly unpredictable world. There could be real advantages, he notes, in owning a Hummer during a major natural disaster. And of the Hummer's ability to break through boundaries in the natural world, he says, "That's not a small thing when you are living in a suburban world where everything seems controlled."

 

About the Author: Randall Frost, a freelance writer based in Pleasanton, Calif., is the author of The Globalization of Trade. His work has appeared in Worth, The New England Financial Journal, CBSHealthWatch, Brandchannel.com, and a variety of educational publications.