Life is stranger than fiction. If anyone tries to tell you differently, simply point to the Canadian man who built the truck you see above, from scratch. Francois Couture, known in his posts as "H150", showed up in the Full Size Bronco forum on September 17, 2004 with a simple query: "Since I'm a Ford nut but always wanted a HUMMER but don't have lots of money, I decided to fabricate my own [based] on Ford truck frame..."
As forum users do, there were soon people offering a multitude of answers to his questions. But what the other users discovered rather quickly was that this guy was, literally true to his word, was fabricating a HUMMER H1 from nothing but plans. Using steel from his job, he built his own sheet steel bending machine, and over the last four years has been welding together a HUMMER H1 practically out of thin air. And get this: before he started his project, Francois didn't know how to weld. He learned to weld in order to build the truck. And he's good. Like, awesome. His fabrication work is as professional as anything you'd see from folks with a lot more money than a dedicated husband and father in Quebec. The H1 is being built on a donor frame from a 1987 Ford F150, with an engine from a donated E-350 Super Duty shuttle van, and a whole bunch of other ingenious swaps, all from Fords. If you have the time to read 45 pages, it is worth it. Our favorite name for the truck so far: H4d. After four years and a bit, he's still working on it, and he's taking donations at the behest of other forum members in order to get the truck finished this summer.
HUMMER's image has always been one of excessive excess. While much of that portrayal is due to GM's own marketing, the people who purchase the imposing 'utes – be they high-profile celebs or well-to-do suburbanites – have done more to define the brand than GM's marketing boffins ever could. But the General wants to change all that.
Mark LaNeve, GM's North American veep of sales, service and marketing, is spearheading a campaign that's trying to show HUMMERs in a different light; specifically vehicles to get a particular job done. "No one criticizes a bulldozer for its gas mileage. That's because it's built to do a job," laments LaNeve in a USAToday interview. Fair enough Mark, but a bulldozer has a single-minded purpose – moving earth – whereas HUMMERs aren't always being used to plug mud and move boats. They've become lifestyle vehicles that are often not used for their intended purpose – just like the majority of SUVs on the road.
Regardless, GM's recent ad campaigns attempt to show the HUMMER in a more functional light, depicting the overblown SUV hauling firefighting gear and helping out with natural disaster relief. "Purpose Built" is the new tagline, but at the end of the day, no amount of PR will help HUMMER if people continue to see them parked outside the local Starbucks.
