Mr. J.E.Brubaker's Creations

Tuesday, October 4, 2016
Sunny with clouds
19 Celsius / 66 Fahrenheit

Mr. J.E. Brubaker's Creations

Today, October 4, I hit the 400,000 page views milestone, and decided to write about toy patents. This is where the genius of talented people comes from in order to make successful toys. The creator of the patent was Mr.  Brubaker, and the Original Assignee" was the Hubley Manufacturing Company. 

I selected these visual patents because they represent the ingenuity of inventors and toy designers like Mr. Brubaker. Also, these patents made excellent wall decorations when framed. You can find many of these patents either at the US Patent Office or on Google.

 When you type in "Google toy Patent Inventions", you will find many toy inventions on a Google sub-website. Interestingly, there are several people and companies who actually sell these patent sheets on the Internet and on ebay!  So now you know where to download them at no cost!

   You probably never ever heard of J.E.Brubaker. Mr. Jacob Brubaker was the chief toy designer and created for the Hubley toy company in the 1920's-1930's. If you've been following my blog, you'd know that was a great time period for cast iron toys, and Hubley was one of the larger companies to make these wonderful toys at the time.

Please click here to visit the U.S. Patent Office website

Please click here to visit Google Patents' search page

   The U.S.Patent office website is very complicated when it comes to finding patents of any kind. If you like the patents screen-captures below, then an easier way to find them is to type in search words such as "toy patents" in your search engine, and then change the viewing from "all" to "images". I use Google as my search engine, and it's the best for finding the patent screen-captures that you'll see below.

   Toy cap guns were very popular in the 1920's-1930's,and Hubley and Mr. Brubaker certainly made and patented several. For those who don't know, a "cap" is a small double-sided piece of paper that has a small amount of  powder in it.  The cap is placed in front of a "bullet", and when the gun hammer strikes the bullet, the cap ignites and makes a large "bang" noise.  I used to have a "cap gun" six-shooter as a child, and every Saturday morning, I would go through a several dozen caps and fire off the gun. Nobody ever complained, but I'm quite sure that I certainly woke up some people on the street!

The Hubley grasshopper was a very successful and unique type of "pull toy". As a child pulled the grasshopper, the legs moved back and forth,and up and down. At the same time, a small metal strip (part 18 in the diagram) and a small gear with teeth (part 17) would rotate. This created a "clicking sound" that resembled a cricket-like "chirp". Since this toy was patented, it was the only cast iron grasshopper toy at the time.

The airplane below is pressed steel and was patented in 1939. What is unique to this toy is that the landing gear (tires and rims) are able to be position in the horizontal or vertical positions. In the horizontal position, the landing gear would be parallel with the wing and flat. In the vertical position, the landing gear was in the vertical position, and the toy could be rolled on the ground. 

The toy below was patented in 1934 and was modelled after the Chrysler Airflow. THe "real" car was made by Chrysler and is very beautiful, and advanced for its' time. However, it was never a success in terms of sales, and was discontinued afar only 3 years of production.

On the other hands. tens of thousands of these cast iron Hubley toys were manufactured.  What made this toy unique is the fact that the undercarriage (underneath the top body of the car and includes the tires and rims) could be separated from the car body. By removing the spare tire (6b), from the rim (6), the car could be dismantled (taken apart).

I purchased one of these toys on ebay, and it certainly was a fantastic toy to have in anyone's collection. I enjoyed it, by taking it apart!

The cast iron convertible below also could be taken apart. A strong flexible wire  (part 4) could be hooked to part 3, which resembled a small hook. IN this position, the undercarriage and the upper car body were together. When the wire was positioned "off the hook", the 2 parts could be separated. 

Some of the Hubley cast iron toys  has a light or pair of lights at the front.THese were battery-operated, and could be turned  on or off. Below are a car racer and a motorcycle. Part "L" is the front headlight and part "D" is the battery.THese toys were also very popular, and are highly prized as collectibles 83 years later. They also happen to still work as well!

I would like to thank all of you, my readers, who have discovered my website and who have allowed me and my blog to reach this milestone. Relatively speaking, by far, I am not hugely successful as a website, but 400,000 page views is nothing to be ashamed of either. I hope to keep writing, and I always invite any of my readers, auctioneers, or collectors to write to me if they would like me to create a post for you. ANd for all the people and companies who have contributed ,

I thank you very much.

Thanks for dropping by today,

and as always,

Have a great part of the day or night,

wherever you may be.

Stacey Bindman

toysearcher@gmail.com

A Reissue of an Old Post

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

A Reissue of an Old Post

Background:

   If you have been following my blog, you will have read a post titled Blogger Miseries. My blog, Google e-mail, and my personal Hotmail e-mail were spammed for thousands of times. I'll let you read my original post, rather than rewrite the same material. 

   I removed 10 posts that were spammed and sent feedback to Blogger, not that they ever read it. You have to consider that Google Blogger probably has 200,000,000 or more blogs. So I don't think Google is going to resolve a problem where about 200 bloggers write for help or complain on the Google Blogger Help Forums.  Google,s main line is that they really can't do much about spam, and people should never open it up if it in your mail.  Also, Google says that if you don;t open up the mail, and trash it, it's harmless.

  However, I feel that Google should and probably can do something, but they don't or do?

  I sent Google feedback and complaints via their send feedback on every Blogger page. As well, I wrote that from then on, I would remove the visibility of every post from then on that was affected by spam. Mysteriously, within 10 days and 10 post removals to draft mode the spam stopped!

  I've retitled the post and removed the original title, lest the spammers find this post again and start the spam cycle all over again. The reason that I was so irritated was the fact that I was working very hard to reach the 200,000 page view milestone (achieved on August 25, 2014). Sadly for me, I did not achieve that number truly, since there was so much spam. Today, I have  221,425 page views as of 17:33 P.M. EST (Canada), so thais is probably an actual 200,000 less the spam.

  I rethought my strategy, and decided to reissue all 10 posts, but edit them as well, and hide the original name, as I mention before. 

  This post received 7,115 page views, but as I mentioned 1000's were probably spam.

Monday, March 19, 2012

(This post originally appeared on the above date)

The new material appears in this colour type.

     Like today, the toy companies would make model toys based on current "real life" cars.  The  actual  Chrysler Airflow was made for a few years, but production stopped since the car was not a success in terms of sales. There were probably 1000x more toy cast iron Chrysler Airflow toys made than the actual real cars. If you search for Chrysler Airflow> on the Net you will see a truely >gem of a car for that era.

I've written about the Hubley model, so for today, I also include that one as a comparison. The Arcade toy shown today measures 4"(L)x 1 1/2"(W)x 1 1/2"(H) or 100mm x 38mm x 38mm. It's just a bit smaller than the Hubley.

The Hubley Airflow

(Length 4 1/2" or 112mm)

A "reproduction"Hubley-style toy car

There are several characteristics to inform you that this is a fake:

1. The surface finish of the car is very course compared to authentic cast iron toys.

Compare the red fake above to the beige one below.

2. The white wheels are metal, whereas the real toys 

have rubber tires  on wood rims or even metal rims.

3. The Hubley had a special patented system of attaching the upper body to the lower chassis. You can see how this was done in the first large image LOOK AT THE LOWER LEFT PHOTO. THe spare tire goes around the rim of the lower  nickel-plated part. This jus how the 2 parts are held together.

With the fake, a screw on the spare tire hold the parts together.

4. The lower chassis part on a real toy was nickel-plated,whereas the fake is

a cheap cast iron casting.

The Hubley Enlarged

The Arcade Chrysler Airflow

The basic Arcade design is similar to the Hubley however the differences are:

 1. More windows on the Arcade

2. Less-sophisticated grillwork on the Arcade

3. Single Fornt Window on the Arcade, whereas the Hubley is split in 2.

4. The rear window on the arcade is one, whereas the Hubley is split in 2.

Of course, there could have been 2 models of the Airflow!

You can see hw many times this toy had been repainted before I finally received it. At the time, I never even thought of restoring it!  Now that I think why (to myself), I realize that I'm I liked the fact that here was a toy that probably was passed from generation to generation for who knows how many years. With character like that, I won't want to alter the toy in any way, and I didn't

Self-evaluation of this almost 2 year old post:

When I look at this post, I realize how much I've changed my writing and my photos. Of course, I don't buy and sell anymore,  but I have 1000's of my own photos that I have not used before.I use many more photos in each post and I write more, although I'm sure a few of you (my readers) think I ramble on or talk too much! 

Also, at the time 2 years ago, I liked to use more dramatic lighting on the toys. whereas today, most of the photos that I use had simpler lighting. As well, I have removed most backgrounds and foundations (what something sits on ), but left a few shadows.

The best judge of this blog would be my readers, so if you have any suggestions, I'd be happy to hear from you. You can write to me at my address below, and I will keep your name confidential.

Thanks for dropping by, and have a 

good morning, afternoon, or evening wherever you may be.

Stacey

toysearcher@gmail.com

Replacement Parts for a Small Hubley Airflow

Thursday, February 6, 2014

Replacement Parts 

for a Small Hubley Airflow

   The last toy that I purchased was a Hubley cast iron Airflow. The original car was made by Chrysler, but wasn't a success. Production only lasted about 3 years. But it was a beautiful car, and if you do a search through my blog, or go on the Net, you will see just how beautiful this car was.  Ironically, almost every one of the major toy manufacturers of the time (e.g. Hubley, Arcade, Kingsbury for example) made these Airflow toys, and the total number of these toys was probably at least a million or more!. Any one of the Airflow toys is one of my favourites just for its elegant design.

  I ordered replacement parts for this Hubley (5"/125mm in length) since it came with the parts missing.

Part I - The Hubley with missing parts

The toy came with 3 hubs and a few white tires, but I decoded to replace everything.

If I didn't, the combination of old and new would look out of place and irregular.  

However, in the end, I kept one old red wooden hub. I'll explain the reason for that at the end.

The above part is the underneath chassis. It was a patented designed past that allowed the wheels to be attached to it. The attachment of the underside chassis with the frame was quite unique. By attaching the rubber tire to the red wooden hub at the rear of the car (the spare tire), the 2 parts stayed together. You'll be able to better understand and see what I'm talking about with the next sequence of photos.

Part II - The ordered missing parts

The left part of the photo is the back of the car. The 2 rims are loose and can fall off. 

However,when they are attached together into the car, the rear fenders that completely cover the tire hold them in place. The reason the rear tires and hubs can fall off is that the axle is not hammered at either end.

The front axle is id different. It is rounded at one end to keep both hubs and tires on the axle. The reason, is because there axles are exposed, so that unless the ends of the axles are carefully hammered with a ball-head hammer, they can fall off.

I had to carefully drill through the hubs to slightly widen the diameter of the holes through their centres. I then used a small amount of ayer to soften the wood, and carefully moved the wooden hubs along the axle. 

To get the rubber (they might be silicone-rubber combinations) tires on to the  wooden red hubs, I warmed them up slightly and used a mild soap to slip them on the axles. I then carefully fired any excess water so that the ere would not be any dripping. However, the wood hubs are painted quite well, and there wasn't any dripping of paint from the water.

The 2 photos above show you how the 2 pieces of the cast iron car fit together.

Once the rubber tire is placed on the metal "hub) at the back of the car, the 2 parts of the car are firmly attached together. The larger diameter white tire acts like a nut to firmly hold the car together.

The idea is so simple, but unique - hence the patent to Hubley for the idea and design.

For now, I'm leaving the well-aged and scratched and rusted toy "as is". You can see what a beautiful toy this was and still is. Hubley made many different sizes of this car, and they all are great. There was even one with a battery and front headlights. That is one of the more expensive and sought after Chrysler Airflows.

If you look at the last photo, that red hub is the original. I left it there because I didn't want to chase breaking one the the replacement wooden hubs by drilling, and then getting then on to the front axle. As it turned out, the work was much simpler.

Of course, an easier way would have been to simply buy a new front axle altogether. 

But then again, I like a small challenge. What fun would there be if I replaced every part on this 80 year old toy?

Thanks for visiting,

and have a great day, 

wherever you may be,

Stacey

You can contact me anytime at:

toysearcher@gmail.com

The Chrysler Airflow Cast Iron Toys

Thursday, January 17, 2013

The Chrysler Airflow Cast Iron Toys

    I've written about this fabulous toy before, but only presented my own limited range of photos for this  car. The Chrysler Airflow was a beautiful car manufactured from 1934-1937. Sadly, the car wasn't the success that Chrysler would have liked, and the car was discontinued. When I first wrote about the toy, I wrote mostly about a few Hubley cars that I had purchased and resold. The Hubley Airflow is a beautiful take-apart toy. You remove the rear spare tire first. This then allows you to remove the clear-metal chassis (undercarriage) from the top coloured part.

    Thanks to the many people and auction houses that allow me to use their photos with their permissions, I am able to certainly expand the breadth of images than when I was buying on E-Bay.

http://www.bertoiaauctions.com

(please click on the above address to be redirected to the Bertoia Auction site)

    From my point-of-view the CHrysler Airflow was certainly an eye-catcher. The front grill, the triple-pieced bumper, the side vents, the headlight paired with the lower set of (I assume) fog lights), the sleek design, and the spare tire in the rear are beautiful features. However, the public saw the car differently fromChrysler, and production stopped.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:%2734_airflow_rear_2.JPG

(please click on the above address to be redirected to the Wikipedia Chrysler Airflow article)

    I don't think Chrysler made all of the models that the toy manufacturers made, although I'll have to verify that. However, the toys from all of the different companies certainly are in my top 10 favourites list.  For myself, there's something about a heavy toy or piece of wood thats fascinating. It's that "feel" and sense of tactility that grabs you. I had that same feeling when I purchased a piece of ebony from an exotic wood importer. If you've never lifted a piece of ebony, you'd be very surprised at just how dense and heavy it weighs, and that's the same feeling that I get from those cast iron toys. Of course, their simple but elegant designs also attracts me to them.

   This is another one of my posts that I enjoyed writing. And when the spring comes,and the flea markets start up again, go out and see if you can find some of these wonderful Chrysler Airflows. You will definitely not be disappointed!

Thanks for visiting,

and as always,

have a great morning, afternoon, or evening,

wherever you may be.

Stacey