1920s hubcap

[Jim Skelly]

I picked this up at a swap meet years ago.  I think it was only used from 1922 to 1928.  Can anyone verify the years?  

 

I have noticed some have the background painted to match the wheel rim.  Are they supposed to be bare aluminum?

 

Thank you.

[Hubert_25-25]

Is that cap aluminum or brass.  Buick switched to aluminum in 1926.  Brass is 1925 and earlier.  The field around the Buick text is body color.  The wheel was typically painted body color, except the demountable rim was plated or black.  

Edited April 4, 2021 by Hubert_25-25 (see edit history)

[Jim Skelly]

Hello Hugh,

 

Thanks for your response.  The one I have is aluminum.  I looked at various years on the Internet from 1922-1928 and some had painted hubcaps, but most were not.  A few cars had the wheel rims painted to match the body color.  

[Hubert_25-25]

Jim,  I do not know when they first started using primers, but that helped with paint durability and sticking to a surface.  The mid 20's Buick headlight, tail,  and cowl light rings were also painted black on top of the nickel - around the edge but you only find a few owners that know this detail and paint them as original.  This period advertisement shows the bezel paint.  The other thing to note is that in the large Buick book of parts, it lists the hubcaps by color and year.  Dealers stocked or ordered colored hubcaps.  They did not paint them at the dealerships.  The photo of this book page only goes up to year 1925.  There are similar pages for 1926 thru 1931.   Hugh   

 

Edited April 4, 2021 by Hubert_25-25 (see edit history)

[Jim Skelly]

Hugh,

 

Thanks for the additional information.  I had assumed that people painted some of these hubcaps when restoring their cars just to add a custom touch.  Did some of these come from the factory after 1925 without paint, or have most of these had the paint removed since a lot of the paint had worn or flaked off?  

[Hubert_25-25]

Jim,   1928 was the last year listed in my book with a multitude of colors listed for hubcaps that matched the body colors.  At some point I imagine black was the color for all the hub caps.  Plated surfaces and even bare aluminum is not going to hold paint for very long without proper adhesion techniques like roughing the surface and using primers.  They did neither of those with these older cars.  Some of this paint just  had to survive the showroom floor.    I am under the impression that none of these came unpainted as there is not a part number available to order them unpainted.   Hugh

Edited April 6, 2021 by Hubert_25-25 (see edit history)

[Jim Skelly]

Thanks for the additional information, Hugh.  I really appreciate it!

 

Jim