Auto Parts
In twelve years of detecting I’ve found quite a few old car parts, including valve stem covers, gas caps, and headlight bezels and trim. Some I’ve kept, and some not, but here are a few of my favorites.
This 1954 Buick Skylark headlight trim was found right along a road, while I was searching for an old sawmill. It was partially buried, and I presume that there was an accident on the road just above at some point in the past. It was a pretty unique find, and discovering the exact make and model was really interesting.
This Pontiac piece has been a lot more difficult to identify. I spent quite a bit of time searching the internet with no luck. It might be a hub cap centerpiece or a gas cap cover, but both of those options seem unlikely. I believe it’s too heavy to be a hub cap center, though I suppose that could explain why it was lost. And there’s nothing to grasp to turn for removal it if it were a gas cap, so that’s even more unlikely. I also checked for bumper and grille emblems, but with no luck. I believe it was a steering wheel center cap because nothing else makes much sense. If you know what this is, what year it was produced, or any other information about it, please let me know.
GasLox Ivano made after-market locking gas caps in the 1940’s and 1950’s, and this is a particularly nice example. A quick internet search yielded little information about the company other than its current iteration is Swedish, though I wasn’t able to discover if that is exactly the same company as it was in the 40’s-50’s, or if it is a new iteration. This was also found near a road, but not near a gas station, so it’s unlikely that it was simply a matter of falling off the top after someone forgot to replace it after fueling up.
I found this headlamp pull knob (for turning your headlights on and off) at a picnic area that dates to the 1930’s. This particular piece dates between 1934-1939, so it was off a fairly new car at the time it was probably lost. This came from a Plymouth, Dodge, DeSoto, or Chrysler, but narrowing it down further is impossible given the information I have. If you know anything about it, or specialize in these brands for that era, please let me know.
Next up is a 1920’s Buick dust cover/grease cover (now called hub caps), which is really unique in that I believe it came off a very early wood-spoked wheel. These covered the center of the wheel to keep water and dust out of the greased wheel bearings and the loss of one would have been a bit of a problem for the owner of the vehicle.
Next up are four early valve stem covers from the early 1900’s. The shorter pair are marked “Schrader”, and the other two are unmarked. Research shows that they were in use from the earliest days of the automobile through the late 1920’s. None of these were found near the Buick hub, but this type would have been in use on that wheel. They are all brass, and would have looked sharp on a new vehicle.
Mustang has long been one of America’s favorite automobiles. I believe this grille emblem was broken somehow, and then discarded because I found it at an old house site that was torn down in the late 60’s. I’m sure someone was heartbroken when they broke it. They very likely discarded it and replaced it with a new one. Based on the numbers stamped on the reverse, I can narrow it down to 1965-1967, so it wouldn’t have been very old when it was discarded.
That’s really cool! I don’t remember you showing me those old “hub caps” before — I’ll have to look at them next time I’m around. I like the valve stem covers too!