Why Were Center Caps Necessary?
Are they hubcaps, center caps or wheel covers? What is the distinction between them? Where did they come from anyway? These questions do not normally come to mind but they are interesting.
Hubcaps have received as much love as the cars they go on. Even the Chrysler Building honor hub caps with the art deco style found there.
Why were they even developed? They were developed out of necessity. Before metal was used, spokes were made of wood. The hub, located in the outer rim, had to be coupled with the spoke. A grease packed wheel bearing was located inside the hub. To contain the grease and keep out dirt, a cover had to be used.
What was needed was a hub cap. So this hub cap came into being for functional causes, but it was small center cap created to cover the hub and leave the spokes bare. The spokes made out of wood were not created for this world. They were glossed and occasionally adorned with pin-striping but they aged and cracked and did not look to good. Automobiles with aging spokes could be heard from a distance.
The late twenties and thirties, saw a design change to steel wire-spokes. These needed the center cap as well. As with the previous design, the spokes were still left bare. The thirties, need took second play to style. Hubcaps got bigger and were stamped by the auto maker with their name in stainless steel or brass and were meant to be decorative, however, the spokes were still left bare. They were difficult to clean and were irritating because of the wind noise they made on the road.
In 1934, Cadillac developed the first disc that covered the entire wheel. It provided a streamlined look.
Cadillac started using pressed steel wheels in 1938. Full sized hubcaps were used for the wheels. What is important is that Cadillac made this cover a symbol of comfort and style. It didn’t take hot rodders long to look for old Cadillac wheel covers for the 1930-1950′s customized hot rods. Those who owned Cadillac’s started having their covers stolen.
The 1970′s brought the beginning of the use of plastic hubcaps by automobile makers on the cars. Steel hubcaps were tossed aside during the 80′s and plastic hubcaps continued on. Plastic automatically makes people think of cheap and easily broken pieces. That is not true with this plastic. The plastic used on hubcaps is weightless, resilient and tough. Some weightless hubcaps come right off a car. Keep in mind that automobile makers produce these items that are not all that perfect either. They also come off quite simply. It is not enough to have all these things combined though. All hubcaps have to have an unyielding retention system. A 360 degree, all steel retention ring is the absolute best. It simply holds on to the wheel and holds the hubcap in place.
You are now an official expert on hub cap history. Amaze all of your friends with the information that you have gained on the elusive hubcap.
Finding the best info about center caps can be overwhelming at times. One of the best places we found online to get the straight facts about wheel center caps is http://center-caps.org
"i'll have to explain all the hub caps later…."
It would be helpful to have the sentence so we could know the context. If it was about a toy gun, or using a rock on a flat stone to set them off, they could mean caps that were a little dot of gunpowder that made a "snap" like a gunfire. It was a sandwich of paper, cream on the bottom and red on top. The gun had a peg to hang the roll of snaps on. They were fun, with that blast of smoke smell.