Question: Help Identify This Hubcap

[Baldie88]

OK, I'm generally on the C4 section so please bear with me. My son-in-law enjoys finding unique gifts for me. At Christmas he gave me a hubcap which to me looks like it is from maybe a 58 or so. I am posting several pictures to help identify it.

What is puzzling is that it is bronze or brass. Not painted but actually looks like it has been bronzed, like they use to do with baby shoes many years ago (yeah, I'm really old). On the back of the hubcap it has handwritten "brass". I could not find any part numbers on it.

Now I know that Chevrolet probably never made a brass hubcap but from the looks of it, with several dents and imperfections, it looks like it was actually used.

So I'm thinking somebody took an old hubcap and had it bronzed, which is kind of weird, but I don't really know what I have. So hopefully someone can give me a clue of maybe what this is.

Thanks,

Ron
"Baldie88"

 

[gmjunkie]

Looks allot like a 62 Impala SS cap,But they were Aluminum.

Send JohnZ a PM and quiz him,He'd know if anybody!!

 

[Huskerman]

58 or 59 Corvette I'm thinking...........they were chromed so don't know why its bronzed....


.

 

[Tom Bryant]

Not chrome but aluminum. I believe they had some sort of clear anodizing on them to retain the shine like passenger car grilles of the era, 1958 up to the time plastic took over. Although these were used with the wide wheel option on C1 Corvettes their primary use was the cheap full size Chevys that didn't have full wheel covers. They are expensive now but they were made by the millions back in the day and thrown away when replaced with wheel covers, used as dog dishes and parts cleaning pans among many other uses. I use one under my compressor to catch the water when I drain it. I have no idea why someone would plate one of these unless they were doing it for some custom application. Maybe it was used as a decoration on a trophy or something.

Looking at the pictures it appears that the plating was done after the cap was used and dented. Maybe someone at a plating company was just screwing around one day or testing brass plating on aluminum.

Tom

 

[SebringBill]

What Tom said is probably correct. The cap is NOT a 58, as those had only 3 "spines" as opposed to 6 on yours.