Features Traditional Wheels, Part 4 (Full Wheel Covers)

Sure! I have a guest room that doubles as a reading room and mildew-sniffing den.

Well, the Lincoln caps are certainly its best feature. I believe there actually is a law against putting a '32 grille on a '33-34 Ford.

 

re: the '32 grills on model 40's. Would it too late to retract what I said about respecting your opinion? The den sounds a lot like the apartment we were living in before we bought our house...

 

Tony, I remember reading about them being torque converter parts or some such when the car was built and first covered in the mags.

 

I have been looking for a set of 16" wheel covers/hubcaps for my '41 Special Deluxe with the original 16" wheels. Did Cadillac actually make a 16" version of the sombrero wheel cover or was it a 15" with a adapter? Which brings up my next question, has anybody used a 16" beauty ring as an adapter for a 15" wheel cover? I have located a set of, what the seller claims are, Cadillac wheel cover adapters. 50Fraud, or anyone else, do you have any knowledge about this? Pictures would be a plus...

 

I have been told of 16" Sombreros, but have never actually seen them. And assuming that they exist, I don't know if they were factory caps for use on '47 Cadillacs, or aftermarket copies of the Cadillac design adapted for the larger wheel. There were aftermarket copies of 15" Sombreros for sure, and I understand that there were 16s as well.

Using beauty rings as an adapter to mount a smaller hubcap to a larger wheel was done with some frequency. It would be wise to attach them to each other by welding or screwing to insure that the hub cap doesn't slide off of the ring. I had not heard of wheel cover adapters made by (or for) Cadillac, but they certainly may exist. Sorry, I don't have any related pictures.

 

Not pimping their business,but he's posted these on F/B

 

Thanks for the info. I ran across these, last night, on ebay. Seller claims they were made to adapt the 15" Chevy pick up wheel cover to the 8 lug 16" wheel.

 

Wow, those look like they're pretty heavy, but certainly presentable looking. That seems encouraging.

I forgot one thing that I knew: take a look at Royalshifter's "Victoria Secret" thread. The caps that he has on his Ford are 16" Lyon Sombrero look-alikes, so they do definitely exist.

 

My original 63 riv hubcaps. I havent seen many of these with the smaller center cone but, I do know they are the originals along with the original US Royal tire on the spare.

 

Here my 54 ford hubcaps on my 31 roadster

 

On my 53 customline I put 56 buick caps...added a bullet to cover the buick script...They fit the car well and looked great

 

In the mid 80's 3/4 ton Dodge trucks had 16" wheels with adapters so they could run 15" wheel covers. Don't know how hard it would be to find a set now though.

 

These are later 1960 Buick 15" but I feel they make a good custom wheel cover...

 

Hot Diggity dog! Just picked these up from my PO box and they are CHERRY. These were my #1 pick. Thansk King Karl.

Now I just need two more. Or I could get a pair of Lincoln Premier caps, and run those on the passenger side. Yea, I can see it now.
Joe car guy;" Hey Bill car guy, you seen that channeled blue T with the lancer caps yet?"
Bill car guy:" Well I saw it but they werent Lancers, they were Lincoln caps".
Joe:" beg to differ, they were lancers, Bill."
Bill: "what, you think I cant tell the difference? Lincoln!"
"Lancers!!"
"Lincoln!!!"
"LANCERS!!" Scuffle, scuffle, BIFF! BAMN! POW!

 

Snapped a pic of these at a buddies shop. Got any clues? 56 olds with 3 extra spinners added is what he said but I can't find anything like them anywhere. Help!




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^ Your buddy is half right. They're _1957_ Olds wheel covers with three extra bars added. Look at hubcaps.org and you can see what the original '57s looked like.

 

I made these from scratch

 

Holy crap Nads, those look great, crazy good job on recreating them!

 

Yeah Nads, nice job...want to show us how you did it?

 

My friend Eric made these cones for me outta stainless.

I had the ribs laser cut out of 20 Ga stainless




They're not finished yet, a 4th ring has to be added to the back and ribs welded in the center of the blades and then I'm getting them electropolished because they're too hard to do by hand.
I welded the rings and all the pieces together, then I cut out the center of the original caps and welded them to the cap.

Then I made some centers using wreaths I found on ebay

 

I know these aren't full wheel covers, but I've been trying to identify these caps for years. The hole in the center is where I attach a bullet to fasten them to the dust cap. The cap didn't quite fit the rims, so thats the only option I could come up with. I like these because they match the beauty rings perfectly. Any idea what these caps are from? Thanx

 

Bass' Roadster is perfect! I really dig the 54 Chrysler covers too.

Nobody's mentioned the '52-'53 Merc covers yet. I put a set I gathered on my '49.

 

very nice job Nads, smart solution to the problem

 

I removed the outer blades from my original 1960 Buick (super deluxe option) wheel covers and added them to my new crossbar hubcaps and they came out pretty good

 

I am reminded of the use, not quite on topic here, of Corvair cooling fans on wheels in '60s/'70s road-racing. The idea was that the fans draw air out from under the car at speed, creating a little extra downforce.

 

I found a set of 16" adapters that are supposedly from a Cadillac, unfortunetly they won't fit my early 16" Chevy wheels.

 

I have 14" wheel covers, and I'm thinking of trying to use the beauty ring trick to adapt them for 16" wheels....will I run into valve stem issues?

 

Cool thread, thanks 50Fraud..
Not sure anyone can offer an opinion, and hope hijack does not offend, but I'll ask anyway- Does anyone have an opinion on what it would take to get a sombrero on this wheel ? Or have a photo of the backside of a repop sombrero? A photo included here of the stock dog dish cap, which is very Sombrero- like ( Aussie Holden);

 

I like them. Gary

 

Just for the halibut, I decided to try some different caps on my own shoebox:



The full moons are certainly traditional on a shoebox; there were fleets of them around in the '50s. I would like to have found the earlier style with a little raised bead an inch or so in from the edge, but they seem to be extinct.

For comparison, here's how it has looked for more than 10 years:



I think the spinners are the BEST caps for this car, but a little change of clothes feels good after all this time.