Clear wagon wheels

[Robohips77]

I could not find in the search I ran any info on the clear wagon wheels. Any ideas what years and what regs these went into? Happy New Year to all.

[Bryan]

I'd like to know myself. They just seem to spring up all over. I have seen them in regulators that were early models and very late ones....Never seen them in a catalog but the could have been aftermarket I guess..

[Robohips77]

Never thought about the aftermarket part. Good Point. Thanks Bryan. Roger VF

[swimjim]

I have a DA which I bought from the original owner that has them. He told me he bought the reg from Montgomery Ward in 1967.

Jim

[Robohips77]

Another intesting piece of the puzzle. Thanks Jim.

[Bryan]

Luis or Pete should chime in here but the clear ones are a different material than the black......Wonder if USD got a deal on the clear that day or even if it was a mistake and they made thousands before anyone realized the material was wrong? We may never know.....

[WD8CDH]

I could believe that. In that era, I have seen hole size determined by what drill size the machinist had that was sharp.

[spectrum]

Unless they were molded with clear polycarbonate (Lexan) which would be unlikely for older parts they would probably be crystal polystyrene and somewhat fragile though there are some fairly tough specialty resins. Being circular and of the standard full cross section they'd be plenty strong but I don't know why anyone would go there.

Are they clear as in crystal of just a natural resin with a skim milk appearance?

What material are the new wagon wheel made from ABS or high impact styrene?

Pete

[Phil]

Re: clear 'valve cages':
Use of the clear cages was discontinued after a relatively short period (by USD) because the black pigment of the mushroom valves leached into the plastic caged material and left it mottled - as though it had been touched by a brown/black felt pen. The familiar black cages followed after - they must have had a ton of them (the clear ones), though, since they keep turning up all over the place! BTW the mottled ones work fine - just look odd. I have some notes on this . . .dates, polymer compound, etc. If anyone has a burning desire to have this info, I will post it next time I root through the 50's stuff.
P.

[Bryan]

Phil, do you have anything in your notes as to "why" they changed to them for a while ?

[Bryan]

What material are the new wagon wheel made from ABS or high impact styrene?
Pete

Unless Luis put the spec on the drawing someplace where I can't find it I don't know fo sho what they are made from?? The folks that built them worked off of the original samples...They build plastic lawn furniture out in sunny California and didn't know a USD wagon wheel from a door knob...

[Phil]

Hi, Bryan:
Do I know why they (USD) tried the clear cages for a while - nope, I don't. They came, they went for the reason stated - I never thought to ask why they switched. If memory serves, this info came from Mr. Fox in the late 50's - probably 1958 - a couple of years after the KLEER E-Z was introduced by USD. Fox was their head reg repair guy - very nice older coot - I learned a lot from him. ('Course in 1958, anybody over 30 was a fossil as far as I was concerned!) Fortunately for my currently fragmented hard drive, I kept detailed notebooks even then - I have boxes and boxes of them! Now the problem is knowing what time line to look in! I was a rep for USD (among others) in 1957/58 - and did all the reg work for the western Canadian USD distributor (Pacific Divers). Man, lot of bubbles since then!
Regards and best wishes for 2008 to all VDH'ers
P.