The original Hummer (H1) will end production in June.

MSNBC Story

 

CNN Article with more content.

 

As if it matters? It's a $130,000+ vehicle. They hardly sold any of them at all. I'll bet you that more guzzler sports cars are sold than H1's, and there's not many of those sold either. The problem are the $20-30k vehicles that get fuel economy in the teens because those are the ones sold by the millions.

 

I'd rather it was the H2.

 

If it were not for the iconic H1's introduction in 1992, there would be no civilian Hummers and possibly other oversized vehicles.

 

Me too. The H1 has a purpose while the H2 is the biggest poser/wanna be vehicle ever.

 

For those that don't know, the H2 uses the same chassis as the Chevy Tahoe.

 

B.S. The Suburban and Ford Explorer are what made SUV's popular to the masses.

 

Not entirely, I think.

The Explorer asbolutely made the SUV genre a household must-have, but the Hummer marketing impact certainly deserves credit for supersizing the SUV mindset.

Remember- the Explorer is much smaller than the Expedition, Tahoe, and whatnot. Shortly after The Hummer splash (compliments of Gulf I) came the Yukon/Tahoe, then the Expedition, Excursion, etc. A good case can be made, though, that the supersizing of the SUV would have occurred anyway. I think the H1 sped it along, though.

The Suburban and Bronco, and Blazer to a degree, predate all of them, and predates many people here! So I don't think the Suburban can take all the credit, though its respin in the mid-90s helped.

By far, the Hummer's marketing impact helped GM and Ford more than AM General. They were already selling several thousand/year to the military- the extra few hundred for civilian use were peanuts.

 

I actually know someone who owns an H1 that he completely overhauled into working order. He's a fairly serious off-road enthusiast. For actually going off road, thsoe H1s are very fun vehicles, as they can climb up just about anything and reach places no other production vehicle can. The car itself is somewhat of a novelty as well, and looks interesting, whereas in my opinion the H2 looks compltely ridiculous. They also get better mileage than the H2s as well (my friend with a generic 327ci gasoline engine averages about 10-11mpg, his friend with a turbodiesel gets about 14mpg)

Until recently, gasoline had been getting cheaper and cheaper, adjusting for inflation. This alone I beleive was responsible in large part for peopel getting larger vehicles -- it wasn't as expensive for fuel. I expect to see a decline in purchases of those cars now.