Wednesday, June 1, 2005

David Coates / The Detroit News Robin Fowlkes of Detroit checks out an H3 in Southfield. "It's better for a woman" than Hummer's bigger siblings, she says.

Will small engine hold back new Hummer?

By Ed Garsten / The Detroit News

Buyer's guide Specs and prices on the H3 Comment on this story Send this story to a friend Get Home Delivery

To the new Hummer H3 steep hills are mere speed bumps, boulder fields are like piles of pebbles and dirt roads may as well be blacktop.

Add in rugged military looks and a surprising 20 miles per gallon and it looks like General Motors Corp. has a well-timed hit arriving in showrooms.

There's just one problem: A growing chorus of critics say the midsized H3 is handicapped by an underpowered engine and is painfully slow when merging onto a freeway or passing.

"To pass anyone you have to floor it," said John McElroy, host of the TV program "Autoline Detroit," after a recent test drive.

GM assembles the H3 at a plant in Shreveport, La., alongside the Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon midsize pickup trucks. All three models are powered by the same inline five-cylinder engine. But the H3, at 4,700 pounds, is about 700 pounds heavier than the pickups, mainly because of the reinforced frame and other equipment that give it its off-road prowess.

"Moving it is a lot to ask of a 3.5-liter twin-cam motor that makes just 220 horsepower and 225 lb.-ft. of torque," wrote AutoWeek critic Andrew Luu.

And Fortune magazine wrote: "If the original Hummer is a truck for the Terminator and the downsized H2 a perfect fit for Indiana Jones, then who is the new, even smaller H3 designed for? Agent Cody Banks? Ace Ventura?"

Hummer marketing director Mark Hernandez said acceleration is not crucial for most SUV buyers.

"It's not a Corvette," Hernandez said. "Zero to 60 was not one of our driving forces. We came up with a vehicle and engine and power train that was a balance between what was good to build from a quality standpoint, both on and off road, and a fuel economy standpoint."

Mark Williams, the editor of Motor Trend's Truck Trend magazine, said the H3 is sluggish on the highway but performed quite well on California's treacherous Rubicon Trail.

"I'm willing to give it a little more latitude, under the assumption the engine is going to be addressed either with a twin turbo or something pretty dramatic down the road," Williams said.

Hernandez says GM is prepared to pack more power in the H3, if consumers demand it.

"We found very quickly we could have put an F-14 jet engine in it and somebody would still say you're a little slow on power," Hernandez said.

The I-5 engine provides the H3 with an attribute never attached to any Hummer -- decent fuel economy.

"It's a five-cylinder engine and gets 20 miles a gallon, which is good for the Hummer brand," said Mark LaNeve, GM North America vice president of vehicle sales, service and marketing.

Even as fuel prices have begun to moderate, that selling point is a big deal to a brand that has been a target of environmentalists who regularly lambaste the less fuel efficient H1 and H2.

GM engineers would have preferred to give the H3 a more powerful engine, but in order to make the business case to build the vehicle alongside the Canyon and Colorado it was more cost-effective for the same engine to be installed in all three vehicles.

That sort of trade-off, however, may put the H3 at a competitive disadvantage against off-road midsize SUVs with more powerful engines, says Karl Brauer, editor-in-chief at the vehicle shopping Web site Edmunds.com.

"They may say 'this thing goes off road too and isn't nearly as gutless,'" Brauer said.

With a base price of $29,500, the H3 is designed to put the brand within reach of thousands of less-affluent consumers who aspire to own a Hummer.

The H2 starts at $53,000 and the H1 carries a starting price of $100,000-plus.

GM is not looking to sell huge numbers of the H3 and wants to maintain the brand's mystique and exclusivity.

The automaker is hoping to sell 30,000 H3s this year and double sales by 2006. Still, GM is counting on the H3 to revive a brand that's seen its sales drop 12 percent this year.

A major marketing push kicked off in May with the intent of winning over buyers in their thirties, especially women.

GM has bought advertising on television shows with large female audiences such as "Desperate Housewives" and "Grey's Anatomy" to get the message out there's a new, smaller, Hummer available.

Detroiter Robin Fowlkes gave the H3 a once-over Tuesday at Detroit Hummer in Southfield, and is seriously considering the vehicle based on its price, size, interior and off-road ability.

"It's better for a woman," said Fowlkes, who works in the billing department at DTE Energy. "The H2 was really big, a man's size."

She was not sold by the H3's fuel economy or turned off by the small engine. "I have a truck and trucks use a lot of gas, so it doesn't make a difference," Fowlkes said. "As long as it has four-by-four and gets me through the winter, that's fine."

A study by Kelley Blue Book found that 35 percent of those who said they would consider buying the H3 are women. But many others said they would not consider buying the H3.

"It's a vehicle that really has gained a pretty high awareness in the marketplace, but not a vehicle that really has gained an above-average reaction," said Jack Nerad, editorial director of Kelley Blue Book.

He believes Hummer may be suffering from the "flavor-of-the-month" syndrome, where off-beat or distinctive products such as the Chrysler PT Cruiser or Mini Cooper are red hot at first then cool.

On Tuesday, a carrier truck delivered four H3s to Detroit Hummer. All but one was already spoken for and sales manager Ken Reszczyk says he sold 38 even before he had any on the lot.

"I'll take as many as I can get," Reszczyk said. "Eight out of 10 people are asking about the H3."

No one, he said, seems concerned about the less-than-ferocious engine under the hood.

You can reach Ed Garsten at (313) 223-3217 or egarsten@detnews.com.