What is Hub Cap (Wheel Cover)?
A hubcap, wheel cover or wheel trim is a decorative disk on an automobile wheel that covers at least a central portion of the wheel. Cars with stamped steel wheels often use a full wheel cover that conceals the entire wheel. Cars with alloy wheels or styled steel wheels generally use smaller hubcaps, sometimes called center caps. A wheel cover is also an accessory covering an external rear-mounted spare tire (also known as a spare tire cover) found on some 4×4 vehicles. Early hubcaps were very small, sometimes merely covering the greased wheel bearing. These snap onto bulges on the wheel, and to change the wheel they are pried off with a tool resembling a very large slotted-tip screwdriver. This differs from the spinners that serve the same purpose for racing cars and those cars with wire wheels, which were designed to be quickly unthreaded by hand. Most hubcaps were once made of chrome-plated steel or stainless steel.
