Hubcaps

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John Hill
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Re: Hubcaps

#21 Post by John Hill » Tue Mar 15, 2022 2:45 am

My grandmother and her sister were driving to town in their Model T when one remarked on a tyre rolling down the road. The wooded spoked wheel had been reduced to a ragged nub by the time they reached their destination.
Been in data comm since we formed the bits individually with a Morse key.

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Re: Hubcaps

#22 Post by OFSO » Tue Mar 15, 2022 6:35 am

I also now have plastic ties on the car. Means carrying a pair of 88's in the car to cut the ties in case of a puncture and they need checking themselves as they disintegrate in UV light.

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Re: Hubcaps

#23 Post by Malvernian » Wed Mar 16, 2022 5:28 pm

"Pair of 88's", not heard of those for a very long time. Do they still call them that?.

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Re: Hubcaps

#24 Post by OFSO » Wed Mar 16, 2022 6:15 pm

Sidecutters No 88, were they not? Late 1950's when I joined the GPO. Tempus bloody fugits...

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Re: Hubcaps

#25 Post by Malvernian » Wed Mar 16, 2022 6:23 pm

Yes indeed I knew 88's as side cutters also. I wasn't GPO, but did attended a lot of GPO/PO training courses, on Strowger switching equipment

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Re: Hubcaps

#26 Post by OFSO » Thu Mar 17, 2022 6:01 am

Marvelous walking into a room full of ratcheting switches. Now it's all silent LED covered cabinets.

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Re: Hubcaps

#27 Post by talmacapt » Thu Mar 17, 2022 9:25 am

In the 60s, I owned an Austin Healey 100/6 (bought for £10 from an estate agent) with wire wheels and knock on hubcaps.

Driving sedately through Drayton (bit south of Abingdon) on the old oute of the A34, I was passed by one of my rear wheels.

The half shaft had failed.

In those days parts were easy to come by and I fixed it myself for less than the price of the car.

Lost confidence in it after that and sold it on for £10?

Taxied out at Tegel in the 748 and felt something was funny as we lined up.

Asked ATC to have a look and they reported one of the nose wheels was about to detach.

Shut down, got out to look, the axle had failed.

Blocked the runway for a goodly while.

Maybe, if we had got airborne it would have bounced over the wall into East Berlin!!

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Re: Hubcaps

#28 Post by G-CPTN » Thu Mar 17, 2022 10:40 am

Hubcaps were also known as navecaps (in the 1940s).

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Re: Hubcaps

#29 Post by JimR » Mon May 09, 2022 2:31 am

OFSO wrote:
Tue Mar 15, 2022 6:35 am
I also now have plastic ties on the car. Means carrying a pair of 88's in the car to cut the ties in case of a puncture and they need checking themselves as they disintegrate in UV light.
Bit late with a reply OFSO, but black cable ties are much more resistant to UV, even the ones not specifically designed for outdoor use.

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Re: Hubcaps

#30 Post by jimtherev » Mon May 09, 2022 9:02 am

Sadly the wheel which overtook me in Wantage market place in 1960 was - or should have been - attached to my rear axle. I was enthusiastically helped in replacing it where it should have been by the stallholder whose display had been dislodged, on the condition that I helped him repair his stall. (After I moved the car, as I had caused a 2-mile traffic jam according to Mr Plod who had other things to say to me.)

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