Wheels and Dampers Pre-79

[1ROW]

I recently purchased a faded black pre-79 Bar-B-Q-kettle with a patent number that I am in the process of cleaning up/restoring. It has whitewall plastic wheels with a small tab damper on top and 3 wide double tab dampers on the bottom.

I am new here and I have some questions about how to date these pre-79 kettles. Specifically I am curious if it is possible to narrow down these kettles by the year. Please forgive me if the information I seek is posted elsewhere.

In what years were the rubber wheels, the plastic whitewall wheels and the current Weber wheel design introduced/used?

Also, my understanding is that single small damper tabs were used on earlier kettles on both the top and the bottom. They then switched to wider tabs, first wide double tabs on the bottoms and then eventually a single wide tab on the top was used as well, eliminating the single small tab all together.
Does anyone know the timeline on these damper changes?

I appreciate any information that you guys may have on these topics or any other similar kettle year info.

[Troy]

your understanding seems right on.

The 70s are full of speculations, we know the order that features and changes happened - but we really don't know WHEN (or if changes even coincide with new years)

we know from a few specimens that at least some (we assume most or all) 1977 kettles had the etched weber logo (instead of raised) on the top vent, two rivet wooden lid handle, wide bowl vent tabs, and the same wheels that modern kettles have (all plastic)

Craig has more documentation and some other 'best guesses'

[addicted-to-smoke]

Double-wide and then single-wide bottom tabs ... do we have pics here of either?

[5280Jeff]

Here are the pics of a redhead I'm working on now. I was told by the owner he and his wife received it as a wedding gift in 1979. The plastic wheels are shown in the last pic.

[Craig]

There's more to come soon on the Age page. Stay tuned..

Here's a few pieces of info. During the 1970s, there were four different wheel styles.

1. Metal Rims/Rubber Treads carried over from the 1960s. (may have been leftovers used with plastic hubcaps into 1970)

2. Plastic Rims/Rubber Treads "Half Rubber" style (Very Early 70s). Seen mainly on Pat Pending kettles.

3. Plastic Rims/Plastic Treads "Thin Whitewall" or "Early Plastics" ( Early-Mid 70s) Seen on both Pat Pending and Pat #'d BBQK's.

4. Plastic whitewalls with "WEBER" cut into the whitewalls. "Modern" wheels. (Mid 70s-present) To Troys point, these wheels were definitely in place for 1977. They may have been introduced around 1975-76 but that's not certain yet.



Dampers of the 1970s

Lid Vent: There are five known lid vents during the 1970s.

1. BBQK "PAT PENDING" small turn tab. (Late 60s-early 70s) Patent filed 11/22/68, granted 11/10/70. Speculation points to these vents only being used during 1969 and 1970.

2. BBQK PAT # small turn tab. (Early-Mid 70s) Speculation points to 1971-1975, however the patent number (granted in 1970) does not appear in the literature until the 1973 catalog.

3. "etched" or "engraved" stylized WEBER logo vent with small turn tab. Current speculation points to 1976-1977.

4. "raised" stylized WEBER logo vent with large turn tab. (strongly resembles the modern lid vent) but with no date code. Speculation points to 1978.

5. Same as above but with the date code. 1979 "A" Vent.


Bowl Dampers:

1. Small Single tabbed. Carried over from the 1960s into the 1970s and speculated to be made into 1974.

2. Large Dual Tabs. Mid 70s-present. Speculation points to 1974-1975 being the changeover. Most definitely in place by 1977.

[MaxBobcat]

Jeff, looks like 79 is close, but a little late....looks like with that vent it would be 76-77.  Could easily be a store with some old stock when the gift-giver bought it.  Nice red!

[Craig]

5280Jeff, nice pickup!!! 



A 1979 wedding gift of a kettle that is pre 1979 should serve as a reminder that we also have to account for NOS when it comes to kettles with a background like a wedding gift, housewarming etc. BTW the perfect wedding gift anyone could receive. IMO... 

[idahome]

I bought this NIB 18 Limey back in February and the owner told me he received it as a wedding gift in 1973. The top damper has the small tab and the bottom dampers have the wide vent tab. Also, it has the all-plastic wheels just like you see today. The only difference I could tell from the wheels on the Limey and brand new wheels is that it the hub caps are slightly different.

[1ROW]

Thank you all for the great information! It looks as though my kettle is from 71 through 75 based on what I am reading here. Hopefully we can narrow it down even further in the future. This website is just great, I am thoroughly afflicted with Weberitis! I will do a post on my kettle when it is all cleaned up. It is my first vintage kettle, a nice craigslist find from here in the twin cities. Since I just figured out how to post a photo:

[Craig]

1row,  thats a sweet looking 22! I love the graphite color and texture that these fade to.  Very similar to mine.

Sent from my SM-T217S using Tapatalk

[1ROW]

Thanks Craig, I like the fade as well. I have however been considering giving it the Pam treatment I have read about, just to see how it would look with it. I kind of want to touch up some of the nicks and scratches but I can't really do that with high heat paint on the faded black.  Tough to give up that nice fade, debating.

[dazzo]

The one good thing about the Pam treatment, it looks really good when done. And later, when you start to miss the faded look, clean it again and leave it outside. The fade will return - like it's meant to be