2007 Hummer H3 from North America - Off Topic Comments

Talking about jeeps; they're just a quad you can legally drive on the road.

"You have a better shot coming out on top when someone tries to enter your space on the road."

Glad to see you really care about anyones safety on the road other than your own... Typical mentality nowadays. People really need to get educated about the safety of a vehicle. Size does NOT equal safety!! The safest vehicles are the lightest vehicle with the right design. It is all about the crumple zones and how well your car isolates the interior from damage. Design....not size and gerth.

Big SUV's and even most mid-sized SUV's are poorly designed for crashes especially the American brands. Do some research and you'll see that cars like the Honda Accord and Toyota Camry have the highest crash ratings period and it isn't because they are huge and weigh 6,000 pounds. Toyota and Honda also score the highest in their SUV lines while the American brands are really low.

Keep in mind that when someone "enters your space on the road" unexpectedly, you will no doubt swerve to avoid them (human nature and reaction) therefore rolling over (at a 25 times greater probability then the foreign brands mentioned) and you will most assuredly careen through whatever is in your way upside down due to the excessive weight of your vehicle. If that is your idea of safety, then good luck.

I'm not trying to pick on the Hummer, but the facts are there in any government crash testing site for safety. I wish the American companies would catch up, but most of the safer cars are still foreign, especially the SUV's. Look at the ratings, do your research on the Hummer and then come on here claiming you are safe driving it. Don't be confused by slick ad campaigns making it seem like you are driving the safest car in the world because it is big and heavy and good off-road.

^^^Oops there goes the Honda plug. IF I wanted to drive a little Honda with no torque I would. Hummers are just great.

It's not a plug for Honda... Just stating facts. American design is well behind the foreign brands. I wish it weren't the case but it has been proven over and over year after year. I'd rather have a small good handling car any day over a huge lumbering SUV that can't get out of its own way. The better mileage is only a bonus... especially with gas quickly approaching $4 per gallon.

"3rd Apr 2008, 21:30.

I'd rather have a small good handling car any day over a huge lumbering SUV that can't get out of its own way."

Well, that's your opinion, but apparently you can't accept that not everybody agrees with it. Why is everybody who wants to do something different from you "wrong"? Perhaps you're the one that's wrong. Perhaps a mid-size 4WD SUV can do some things better than a "small, good handling car" and suits the owner's needs better.

I didn't say anyone was wrong... I am just tired of buyers coming onto these forum sites stating that they are so safe because they can roll over everyone with their SUV.

I have an SUV that pulls the boat around, but I don't commute in it at 80+ mph weaving in and out of traffic like a lunatic. I see these people on the road every single day... So don't talk about needs and uses!!

I know what my SUV is best for, and I use it for just that. A single commuter vehicle and an SUV of any size SHOULD BE considered two different things. Apparently the majority thinks an oversized vehicle that sucks gas is the best choice for them to ride around in solo 90% of the time.

I know my SUV isn't nearly as safe as my car is. It's all about design not size. Do some vehicle safety research and then reply saying how smart your choice of vehicle is... And I won't even get started on how gas would be at least $1 less per gallon if we all averaged 8-10mpg better. We would ALL benefit from that now wouldn't we?

First off, I AM NOT a fan of SUV's (though my wife drives one and a family member has an H-3) but I wanted to address the arguments about how small cars are SAFER.

NO small car (not even the "almighty" Honda) can EVER, under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, come out on top in a crash with even a FORD RANGER, let alone a HUMMER!!

We have lost a very dear friend and an acquaintance when they were in collisions in their cars (one an Acura RSX, one an Accord) with a full size truck or SUV. In the case of the Acura it rear-ended a Ford F-150, which it knocked 20 feet. The Acura crumple zones crumpled all the way back to the driver and she died of massive head injuries. The F-150 driver was not injured.

In the case of the Accord, it struck a GMC Suburban head on, flipped up and over the SUV and both people in the Accord died almost instantly. The driver of the GMC got only a broken wrist.

In an even more telling case, a client of mine's wife hit a Chevy Tahoe head-on in her BMW 740 (a fairly large, VERY well-built car). In that case, ironically, the BMW flipped over while the Top-heavy Tahoe did not. Our friend suffered a severe leg injury requiring months of painful physical therapy. The SUV driver walked away.

In our area virtually EVERY parent INSISTS that their teen-aged children drive either a full-sized truck or SUV for their safety. I encourage my wife to do so for the same reason. Until high fuel costs drastically reduce the large number of SUV's that are NEEDLESSLY bought (you CAN take the kids to their soccer games and get the groceries in a Malibu or Fusion) it makes sense to drive a vehicle that allows you some hope of surviving a collision without death or major injury as a result.

Citing "crash test results" is great IF you don't disregard the disclaimer that is ALWAYS shown which CLEARLY STATES that in collisions with LARGER VEHICLES you are MUCH MORE LIKELY TO BE KILLED IN A SMALLER CAR.

You are right. I'm 19 and currently drive a 1985 Chevrolet suburban 2500 and feel extremely safe, especially against some piece of garbage Honda. It just goes to show that anything that's larger and with body-on-frame construction is safer. That's why my first car was a 1987 Chrysler Fifth Avenue and why I choose a suburban, and my next car will be a 99' Mercury Grand Marquis. Crash statistics don't mean anything in the real world. I couldn't even contemplate the horror of the severity of a crash if my Suburban collided with a Honda civic or any small uni-body vehicle.

If you really want a very good example of a horrific crash, check an article on car safety (and the vulnerability of small cars) in the (I THINK) October 2007 edition of Scientific American. It has a picture of an early Ford Explorer that has literally DRIVEN THRU a little car (Honda Civic I think). The windshield on the Explorer is not even cracked!! It's a very graphic example of how vulnerable small cars are against anything more formidable than a motor-scooter.

Hmm, teenagers: the No. 1 group of drivers most likely to have an accident because they are immature, inexperienced, lack judgment, and their brains are not yet fully formed. And they are driving around in these behemoths. That's just wonderful. It's nice that "daddy's little girl" will be safe, but who will keep us safe from these hedonistic kids in battle tanks?

Hey it's a dream come true... GM is closing most of the truck plants and Hummer will soon be a distant memory!!! BUH BYE!!

You can only do so much to counter the lack of ability of drivers on the road. Honda's and Toyota's are vastly superior design wise to ANY American SUV junk box (PERIOD!!). Just because you know people who have been hurt or killed in them, doesn't mean the car is at fault.

Rear ending an F-150 is entirely the driver of the car's fault in 9 out of 10 accidents, and yes you will get killed when that truck lands in your lap. The car can only protect you so much from this type of accident or a head on for that matter. Even if you had a head on collision with another car, it would be devastating.

You can go and kill yourself in any car or truck if you are not driving properly and skillfully, and yes I know truly unavoidable accidents occur, but not too often when you are focused and paying really good attention to what you are doing, instead of playing with the nav or talking on the phone.

Go and look up the number of deaths in big "safe" SUV's and you'll be surprised. SUV manufacturers are (or were) making a killing off this mentality, and now we are all paying for it at the pump too...

Thankfully this argument will soon be closing as you will see most SUV's and trucks disappearing very soon.

I am almost glad to be paying over $4 per gallon, just to force people to make more intelligent choices when buying their vehicles. I'm sick of seeing single drivers commuting doing 80+ mph driving to work in the morning in these big SUV's, weaving sloppily in and out of traffic.

The facts have been proven over and over that well designed cars are safer than any SUV in normal driving conditions where good judgement and skill are being used.

Now if we could only get them to raise the fine to $1,000 for talking on a cell phone while driving, we'd really be getting somewhere....

It's only normal that parents want to do all they can to protect their children (and wives). My brother-in-law is a doctor who has seen more than his share of seriously injured people who were involved in crashes while driving small cars. Both his teenage daughter and son each drive large, truck based SUV's. He insists on it until SUV's are no longer the largest segment of vehicles on the roads.

Just this morning our local news carried the story of a young woman who was involved in a head-on collision with a late-model Chevy Silverado pickup. She was driving a compact European sedan and is in very critical condition, but, thankfully is expected to live. The driver of the Silverado, who did not even have his seat belt on, was treated and released.

Just because the people in the SUV's don't get hurt, does not make them any safer... Most of the accidents listed on here could probably have been avoided in a smaller vehicle that stops quicker and handles better.

See, so many people think that because they are "safe" in their big truck they are in a safer vehicle. To me safe is avoiding the accident all together, not crushing the occupant's of the smaller car and going on my merry way. If you live by that mentality then I hope you sleep well at night. That is a whacked mentality and selfish to no end. SUV's are just not safe for anyone...

If everyone had a normal size car for what they need to do the roads, we would be much safer overall.

Again, I am talking commuting solo every day. I know there is some need for a large vehicle for travel and boating and such. It is about having the intelligence to know when a SUV is a good choice, and I don't see it too often.

My favorite is the 5' tall woman on the cell in her Tahoe or Expedition that can't even see over the wheel, doing 75, cutting everyone off left an right... Yeah, that's safe!! I see these type of drivers ALL THE TIME!! I don't know about you, but I'd rather they were tooling around in Civics if I have to deal with them during my morning commute.

17:42.

So where you live, it is only the SUV drivers that go 80+ mph on the expressways, weaving sloppily in and out of traffic?

How about all of the teeny boppers in the tricked out Civic's and Corolla's, with the stupid fart cannons for tail pipes and airplane wings on the trunks? Where I live, it is these drivers that are the most reckless.

And do not even get me started on the idiots that ride around on the rice rocket motorcycles doing 100+ mph on the expressways. The SUV drivers are the least of my concerns.

I'm afraid I have to agree with 17:42. I drive the expressways here a lot and it is NOT kids in Civics I worry about (their cars are too small to do any damage). It is the "respectable" businessman (or woman) blasting along at 80mph+ while yakking on a cell phone in their Expeditions, Suburbans and Hummers and weaving all over (or OFF) the road.

We were recently driving at 80mph ourselves when a late model Explorer driven by a middle-aged, clean-cut gentleman passed us so fast the wind rocked our car. He had to be doing at least 100mph. About 5 miles further on his flipped Explorer was upside down in the median and he was frantically trying to get rid of several beer cans before the police were called (he had his seat belt on and was not injured). Small cars DO handle much better than top-heavy glorified bread trucks, so kids in Corollas, Hondas and Focuses probably ARE safer drivers overall.

Other than ego or safety concerns, very few people have ANY use for an SUV. I DO agree that family members are safer in larger, truck based vehicles, but if 99% of the car buying public switched back to more sensible vehicles, we'd ALL be much better off. I know dozens of people who own SUV's and not a single one of them EVER pulls a trailer or hauls anything. Our friends and relatives who own Hummers have never ONCE pulled anything, hauled anything or driven off of a paved road. Why buy something that you have no use for??