Those old advertisements and posters featured some simply lovely artwork and the idea that they were all hand illustrated back then makes them more special.
I own a Hazelwoods bike with at least 100 year old original Dunlop self advertising tyres. As you cycle you leave a trail of. THE DUNLOP TYPE THE DUNLOP TYRE. The bike has been stored in a loft on its original wheel stands. Tyres amazingly preserved.
Another interesting one, particularly for me as my dad was head of purchasing at Fort Dunlop in the 70's. He'd joined them when he left the RAF in 1946. I can remember he was firmly opposed to the partnership with Pirelli from the beginning. He discovered early on that they ran "double accounts" and that the official accounting records had very little similarity with the real ones. So it was fascinating to discover in your video this confirmation of what dad told me back then. When he warned against the agreement he was lambasted by his fellow directors on the board for his "lack of strategic vision". He always said the worst thing you can do in your career is not so much to disagree with your superiors but be proved right later on. He reckoned that was why they never gave him another promotion after. Maybe Dunlop would still be with us if they'd listened to him. He took early retirement in 1983 in disgust. Pity you didn't mention the Dunlop Denovo runflat tyre. I don't know if they went into full production but I remember dad had them on test on his company Princess 2200HLS.
My Dad had Denovo run flats fitted to his Mk1 Escort back in the day . He didn't like them because of the road noise , he said. They were also really expensive. When they were done , he went back to Michelin MX or whatever their popular tyre was at the time.
I wonder if he knew my Dad. He worked up in Lancashire as head accountant at a Dunlop facility making printer's blankets and automotive parts such as engine mounts. He visited Fort Dunlop many times in the 70's and 80's. Alas this part of the business was bought by BTR and sold off bit by bit to the highest bidder. The site in Lancashire is now a Victoria Plumbing warehouse.
Dunlop's under-investment was perfectly exemplified when in 1983 managers from Sumitomo came to inspect the factory in Birmingham factory and found that they were still using the same molds they got *during the Marshall plan* to make tyres. The molds were so past their use-by date the tyres ended up oval-shaped to the point British Leyland had literally no choice but to second source.
Yeah they clearly took too much out of the business. It's greed. What with the price fixing etc. How do you fuck up owning an industry top to bottom? Hubris, bad management and no re-investment. Then they were forced to sell it in bits and died.
LDV were using a press in their body in white plant at Drews Lane that had allegedly been salvaged from the bottom of the Atlantic during WW2. They were pressing panels on it for THE MAXUS IN 2005!!!
Another fascinating documentary which told me a lot. I remember buying from Dunlop Metalastik who were very strong in rubber/metal bondings, suspension, etc. There was a Dunlop aeroplane tyre factory next to Fort Dunlop until very recently - production moved overseas. I wonder if Dunlop diversified too much but their failure must be down to bad management.
8:58 - On the National Highway A20 (Sturt Highway A20), there is a big Dunlop Tyre Arch that sits over the road as you enter the state of South Australia. Have to say it is actually rather cool to drive under and i'm sure its the only one of its kind on a National roadway in the country. I also just purchased my first set of Dunlop Tyres several days ago
It's weird how YT algorithms work. Today I got a burst tyre on my car after clipping a concrete divider, and without searching for it, I come home to find YT recommending me a video on Dunlop. It's a weird world.
I'm a big fan of Dunlop products and it saddens me to watch its demise. All that developmental history during the early years and progression into various markets means nothing if you don't have a management team that is on the ball.I guess another version of 'thinning-out the herd'.
Although Fort Dunlop went in the 1980s the factory next to it survived until 2014. It made specialist tyres - I believe for motorsport. I actually worked with someone who previously worked for Dunlop in Coventry. They made suspension products I believe or the aero industry. I believe the factory still exists and uses the brand.
Indeed, such a shame that Goodyear killed it. Though they seem to be losing interest in the brand completely now. Dunlop Aircraft Tires is still going at Fort Dunlop though, right next to the old famous warehouse. Hopefully they survive the current situation...
@@RallyingSightsSounds Interesting. I actually visited the site in the late 1990s. The company I worked for supplied their fence system. I found it sad going in as it was a fraction of the size of it's former self. So pleased that something is left.
Nice summation of events and well illustrated. I trust you've read 'The Dunlop Story' by James McMillan? Dunlop is a classic British failure story unfortunately, where you have to look into how they managed to throw it all away. They had the added flair of entering a suicide pact with a foreign partner that survived and managed to completely forget about it in time! It's a bit galling to see Pirelli are still so prominent in the industry... Going the wrong way on textile vs steel belt was a major misstep though for Dunlop, not too dissimilar to the mistakes which cost the motorcycle industry dearly. Sad to think what was and could have been, a bit like GEC.
Yesterday I bought a new polyurethane mattress, made by Dunlop Australia - so yeah bits still around (hell my last trainers were Dunlop Volleys) Also for about eighty years a shed on the highway between Cowra and Lyndhurst NSW had a Dunlop painted on the roof, but due to bad decisions of several parties it was lost
The international nature of business. I used to have Dunlop (British) tires on my Japanese motorcycle (Kawasaki) that was made in America (Lincoln Nebraska).
I bought a bicycle pump earlier this week, at the end of the video I checked the small print on the packaging, it says: Dunlop and the flying D logo are trademarks of Sumitomo rubber group and are used under licence by Edco, Eindhoven, B. V. So it's a British company, sold (in part) to a Japanese group who have licensed the logo to an import/export company from the Netherlands for a product made in China which was then sold to a British consumer... It all makes perfect sense now! 🤔
I have Dunlop inner tubes inside French tyres on Italian rims attached via Japanese suspension to an American motorcycle! My XLH is very much a citizen of the world.
These videos are making sense of real product history, just the way Big Car does for the motor industry. Fantastic seeing the motor trade I've been in for 36 years being untangled the way you do it.
The Dunlop "tyre" factory in Buffalo, NY, which opened in 1920 has been in continuous operation since it was built to supply Dunlop brand tires for the motorcycle industry. For a period of time in the early 2000s, Dunlop's "World headquarters" was located in Grand Island, New York, several miles from the plant in nearby Tonawanda. The Office building was originally built in the 1960s for Hooker Chemical Company which became part of Occidental (Oxy) Chemical. Dunlop took over the property after Oxy and occupied the space until around 2009, when it was abandoned and badly vandalized. The structure sat empty and neglected for several years until it was gutted and restored as a Holiday Inn hotel. The Dunlop plant still has it's Dunlop signage in addition to recent Sumitomo and Falken signage.
Your uploads are always the first from the inbox I watch. I've even stopped on on the way home late at night after work to catch up. I seem to have got quite picky in my other general viewing but love the the knowledge I gain from these videos and really appreciate the hard work I know you must put in to create them.
There's a joke in danish about going undercover with a false name, an undercover alias: *Dæknavn* - litteraly "covername". *Dæk* is also the danish word for a tire/tyre. So, the joke is about the undercover spy using an alias like Pirelli, Dunlop, Firestone, etc.
Not sure but you might be making sense after the fact. Because in German you have the 'same' word: _Deckname._ But _Deck_ in itself has no reference to tires in German.
@@Dear_Mr._Isaiah_Deringer Want to complicate it more? In swedish, "Däck" can mean both "tire", "tires", A patio, the deck of a boat, and concrete coverings of ex. motorways.
Just wanted to say I really love your mini documentarys , they are properly first class. I think you could branch out to other topics in and around cars...maybe even totally unrelated things too. Cheers for the entertainment ☺
The old advert at 3.00 min is Dutch and says: Do not be misled! Dunlop tyres They all have this factory logo. All other tyres are counter fit of the real Dunlop
Back in the early 80s I purchased a set of Dunlop belted GT Qualifiers for my 1964 Impala SS they were some of the best wearing tires I've ever owned. .
Not just inflation but modern tires are streets ahead of any of those old ones. My father in the 1960's paid 20 bucks for a 'retread'. I just paid $430 for a single replacement cut down in the sidewall by a curb but that tire is not even related to my dad's retread. I can cruise at 140 K without a worry that my car will kill me. My dad could never say the same. Also I should pay more attention to large curbs (Kerbs?).
Spectacular work as always, though I couldn't help but chuckle at "...wasn't the *first* time the pneumatic tire had been invented." It reminds me of how people seem to now universally say "very unique" when "unique" directly translates to "one of a kind." Can't be very one of a kind, can't create for the first time something twice. ;) :) In any case, keep up the great work! Yours is a real gem of a channel with very compelling content.
Fantastic video, thanks for taking the (probably considerable) time to research and produce it. The 1800-1900 copyright wars and ensuing competition are endlessly entertaining to explore in retrospect. AC-DC, tYres, phone systems, VHS-Betamax (no, wait). We take tYres for granted these days, it's true, and their performance never ceases to increase, whether the user seeks grip, economy or winter performance. Chemistry truly is fantastic. Or as any French speaker might say: le plastique c'est fantastique, le caoutchouc ... Anyway, ramblings over, and let's see who picks up on that one.
Quite. And the original way of doing something is not always 'the right' way. Since when do Americans get to choose the spellings of British words? Remember this is the same country that spells colour 'color' and pronounces z (zed) as zee. Everyone knows zee is how Germans says 'the'.
I came home from work ... yes im back and off furlough any switched on my pc and whooped with delight wen i saw you had posted another excellent video. Thank You (:
I spent the last of my meager student budget on a new set of Dunlop tyres (Australia) in the early 80s, despite being balanced they vibrated badly at 80kmh. Tyre dealer wasn't interested in helping and a couple of years later someone in the industry confirmed that the Dunlop Grand Prix tyre were known to be rubbish. Since then if anyone ever asked me about tyres I advised stay away from Dunlop. And the lesson I learned was that if a product is advertised excessively its probably mediocre.
Interesting video it was good to see the history for the company I work for, I work for what is left from the Dunlop GRG in Manchester which is now under Trelleborg in Czech Republic.
Great video's - really glad I found this channel and it's big brother, I can't imagine what the Dunlop building must have been like when in full swing, I never tire! - of cranking my neck when queued up on that part of the M6 to wonder at it's grandness, even though it's wrapped with Travelodge attire! Dave P
I remember as a young man working at a tyre fitting place and this guy drove in with his brand new 7 series beemer, no more than a month old. A puncture was his issue and i said oh oh oh, why you got these tyres on, he said why, i said You Got Dunlop Distorts on you should get them changed. LOL had a good beer that fri eve, this was in along time ago.
The word "Tire" is a verb, meaning to exhaust oneself physically and/or mentally, while the word "Tyre" is the *correct* spelling of that part of a wheel for a bicycle, motorbike, car, lorry, bus or any other powered vehicle intended for the road.
I am surprised you didn't mention the interesting reason Fort Dunlop was called 'fort'. Apparently, workers used to come by canal, and when then boat reached the nearest point, the chaps would shout out to the passengers 'for Dunlop'. This was misheard as 'fort', and became so well known that it was adopted.
I love the endnote regarding tire/tyre! It's long been my contention that Britain changed its' accent and spellings after the US civil war and the advent of radio, the originals surviving mainly in the the colonies. Consider the archaic West Country accent, and its similarity to modern accents in the southern states. Some Lynyrd Skynyrd lyrics sound like they were written by the Wurzels ('er don't need 'im put 'er down).
Dr. Johnson helped to standardise English in 1750 with his dictionary. I seem to recall the US worked to simplify English spelling soon after the revolution (colour -> color). While accents evolve, I'm guessing the US accent (and Australian) came from an initial amalgum of local English accents (e.g. West country, London, Irish) that formed a critical mass that all new immigrants copied. This looks an interesting article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-language_spelling_reform
I WORKED IN THE IRISH DUNLOP TYRE FACTORY IN CENTRE PARK ROAD IN MY HOMETOWN CORK CITY IRELAND 🇮🇪 THE FACTORY CLOSED IN 1983 A TERRIBLE LOSS TO CORK CITY ALSO FORDS CAR ASSEMBLY PLANT CLOSED IN1984 AN OTHER BIG LOSS TO CORK CITY
"When the Dublin government complained about the smell....." Speaking as a Dubliner there is nothing we complain about more than the smell of things. It's a national pastime.
I am Elias Dunlop I am the next generation to keep the Dunlop generation alive so technically what I’m saying is that he was my great great great grandfather
You forgot about lindsay in dublin dunlop was one of his friends so dunlop would put his prototype racing tyres on some of lindsays bultaco bikes from his dealership and they raced in the tt isle of man and won on the prototype tyres
Surely Tire is like Tired as opposed to Tyre which means nothing, but tyre, a rubber round thing. So US spelling doesn't make sense as the name of a commercial product.
Love the idea of a person going from his dunlop slippers into a pair of dunlop shoes into a car with dunlop tires to go play tennis with his dunlop racket and dunlop tennis ball
After seeing the name "Dunlop" on everything in the early 2000s, I wondered why. It seemed a tire company was making gym bags, tennis rackets and balls, golf equipment and balls, nuclear reactors, etc. etc. Ok, maybe not reactors but "Dunlop" was on everything.
Interesting story, I didn't know the brand dunlop until my dad got new tires for his car a few weeks ago. I think they were made in vietnam he was told.
Amazingly I hadn’t really realised Dunlop tyres (or should that be tires?) weren’t really a ‘thing’ anymore. From around 1993, when I had a Maestro, until I sold my 1999 Mercedes C Class in 2013, I favoured Dunlop tyres. The Volvo C30 I traded the Merc for had decent budget rubber, obviously huge diameter alloys by this time with wide treads, the briefly owned Astra SRi that followed it had some other brand rubber on it and now my V40 rolls on Michelin tyres, a brand I grew to hate in the 80s after some balancing problems on a Cavalier and also during my five years driving rigid HGVs, an Iveco Eurocargo I used was also fitted with a new Michelin and at 55mph it was like driving a bouncy castle. Hated it. But I must admit the V40 is fine. This is the first I knew I couldn’t buy Dunlop tyres that are actually Dunlop.
Yes, but the word "elevator"? It's 4 syllables. Better to use "lift" that's just one. Saying that word in your life is valuable seconds you're not going to get back. 😉
Thanks very interesting, I gotten me some new tires. Urban Splash did the redevelopment of Fort Dunlop, they also did a good job on the art deco hotel in Morecambe, "The Midland". Both high risk developments.
@@drummerboy1390 well you guys much like the USA has been the victims of international jewery! I've got English Irish and Scottish and me some say even a bit of German possibly some French.... I suggest that we join forces and kick some fucking ass!
@Jimmy 83 yes but technically that means that about every English individual would have some amount of German and you know technically probably even French!
Great topic. Bit depressing to cover yet another UK global firm that fell apart amid mismanagement and industrial strife. I was curious about the use of the the brand in various markets around the world. As a Brit in America particularly enjoyed your outro!
I was chatting to my dad who said that British management was rubbish in the 60s and 70s. Given all the companies I've covered, it seems that was the case!
TH-cam recently changed their ad policy to place more mid-roll ads on videos by default. It used to be that creators would have to opt-in for them, now they have to opt-out. And it’s not just for new videos, you’ll see the, more on older ones unless the creator specifically turns them off for each vid. Just saying it’s not necessarily a deliberate choice by our host...
Those old advertisements and posters featured some simply lovely artwork and the idea that they were all hand illustrated back then makes them more special.
They are, and I love some of the art deco styles around the 30s.
❤😮
I own a Hazelwoods bike with at least 100 year old original Dunlop self advertising tyres. As you cycle you leave a trail of. THE DUNLOP TYPE THE DUNLOP TYRE.
The bike has been stored in a loft on its original wheel stands. Tyres amazingly preserved.
I never tire of watching your videos; you've gotten me hooked! Enjoyable and informative as always. Keep on rolling!
Suspicious. Puns intended ?
See what you did there i was quite deflated
@Uncle Joe i like to be balanced
I used to wear Dunlop running shoes in the 70's. Very well made, the soles lasted forever. They were called KT 26
I used to wear Dunlop shoes this morning.
Mine were 'Green Flash'.
My dad worked for Dunlop in Coventry for over 20 years, and I remember driving past Fort Dunlop as a kid saying to my dad do you work there.
Another interesting one, particularly for me as my dad was head of purchasing at Fort Dunlop in the 70's. He'd joined them when he left the RAF in 1946. I can remember he was firmly opposed to the partnership with Pirelli from the beginning. He discovered early on that they ran "double accounts" and that the official accounting records had very little similarity with the real ones. So it was fascinating to discover in your video this confirmation of what dad told me back then.
When he warned against the agreement he was lambasted by his fellow directors on the board for his "lack of strategic vision". He always said the worst thing you can do in your career is not so much to disagree with your superiors but be proved right later on. He reckoned that was why they never gave him another promotion after. Maybe Dunlop would still be with us if they'd listened to him. He took early retirement in 1983 in disgust.
Pity you didn't mention the Dunlop Denovo runflat tyre. I don't know if they went into full production but I remember dad had them on test on his company Princess 2200HLS.
I did mention it, but didn't call out the product name.
My Dad had Denovo run flats fitted to his Mk1 Escort back in the day . He didn't like them because of the road noise , he said. They were also really expensive. When they were done , he went back to Michelin MX or whatever their popular tyre was at the time.
Remember seeing Denovo on a Mini 1275gt.
@@robertwoodliff2536 Yeah I recall hearing that they came fitted with the 1275GT .
I wonder if he knew my Dad. He worked up in Lancashire as head accountant at a Dunlop facility making printer's blankets and automotive parts such as engine mounts. He visited Fort Dunlop many times in the 70's and 80's. Alas this part of the business was bought by BTR and sold off bit by bit to the highest bidder. The site in Lancashire is now a Victoria Plumbing warehouse.
Dunlop's under-investment was perfectly exemplified when in 1983 managers from Sumitomo came to inspect the factory in Birmingham factory and found that they were still using the same molds they got *during the Marshall plan* to make tyres. The molds were so past their use-by date the tyres ended up oval-shaped to the point British Leyland had literally no choice but to second source.
Yeah they clearly took too much out of the business. It's greed. What with the price fixing etc.
How do you fuck up owning an industry top to bottom? Hubris, bad management and no re-investment. Then they were forced to sell it in bits and died.
LDV were using a press in their body in white plant at Drews Lane that had allegedly been salvaged from the bottom of the Atlantic during WW2. They were pressing panels on it for THE MAXUS IN 2005!!!
Harvey Du Cros has the best mustache I've seen, I love these videos I found this channel last week and everything I've seen has been pure quality.
Found his "big car" channel too?
Another fascinating documentary which told me a lot. I remember buying from Dunlop Metalastik who were very strong in rubber/metal bondings, suspension, etc. There was a Dunlop aeroplane tyre factory next to Fort Dunlop until very recently - production moved overseas. I wonder if Dunlop diversified too much but their failure must be down to bad management.
8:58 - On the National Highway A20 (Sturt Highway A20), there is a big Dunlop Tyre Arch that sits over the road as you enter the state of South Australia. Have to say it is actually rather cool to drive under and i'm sure its the only one of its kind on a National roadway in the country. I also just purchased my first set of Dunlop Tyres several days ago
I mean at of missed it hahaha
What a facinating, and very sad, story. Absolutely fantastic video 👍👍👍
Glad you enjoyed it Flemming.
It's weird how YT algorithms work. Today I got a burst tyre on my car after clipping a concrete divider, and without searching for it, I come home to find YT recommending me a video on Dunlop. It's a weird world.
I'm a big fan of Dunlop products and it saddens me to watch its demise. All that developmental history during the early years and progression into various markets means nothing if you don't have a management team that is on the ball.I guess another version of 'thinning-out the herd'.
Although Fort Dunlop went in the 1980s the factory next to it survived until 2014. It made specialist tyres - I believe for motorsport. I actually worked with someone who previously worked for Dunlop in Coventry. They made suspension products I believe or the aero industry. I believe the factory still exists and uses the brand.
Indeed, such a shame that Goodyear killed it. Though they seem to be losing interest in the brand completely now. Dunlop Aircraft Tires is still going at Fort Dunlop though, right next to the old famous warehouse. Hopefully they survive the current situation...
@@RallyingSightsSounds Interesting. I actually visited the site in the late 1990s. The company I worked for supplied their fence system. I found it sad going in as it was a fraction of the size of it's former self. So pleased that something is left.
Nice summation of events and well illustrated. I trust you've read 'The Dunlop Story' by James McMillan? Dunlop is a classic British failure story unfortunately, where you have to look into how they managed to throw it all away. They had the added flair of entering a suicide pact with a foreign partner that survived and managed to completely forget about it in time! It's a bit galling to see Pirelli are still so prominent in the industry... Going the wrong way on textile vs steel belt was a major misstep though for Dunlop, not too dissimilar to the mistakes which cost the motorcycle industry dearly. Sad to think what was and could have been, a bit like GEC.
Yesterday I bought a new polyurethane mattress, made by Dunlop Australia - so yeah bits still around (hell my last trainers were Dunlop Volleys)
Also for about eighty years a shed on the highway between Cowra and Lyndhurst NSW had a Dunlop painted on the roof, but due to bad decisions of several parties it was lost
The international nature of business. I used to have Dunlop (British) tires on my Japanese motorcycle (Kawasaki) that was made in America (Lincoln Nebraska).
I bought a bicycle pump earlier this week, at the end of the video I checked the small print on the packaging, it says:
Dunlop and the flying D logo are trademarks of Sumitomo rubber group and are used under licence by Edco, Eindhoven, B. V.
So it's a British company, sold (in part) to a Japanese group who have licensed the logo to an import/export company from the Netherlands for a product made in China which was then sold to a British consumer... It all makes perfect sense now! 🤔
I have Dunlop inner tubes inside French tyres on Italian rims attached via Japanese suspension to an American motorcycle! My XLH is very much a citizen of the world.
I am a sitting a mile away from that Kawasaki factory.
These videos are making sense of real product history, just the way Big Car does for the motor industry. Fantastic seeing the motor trade I've been in for 36 years being untangled the way you do it.
That Big Car makes good videos. I should do a collaboration some time. 😉
Thanks Mr Big Car, do not forget the transportation of dunlop products to additional markets in the former British colonies of Africa and Asia
The Dunlop "tyre" factory in Buffalo, NY, which opened in 1920 has been in continuous operation since it was built to supply Dunlop brand tires for the motorcycle industry. For a period of time in the early 2000s, Dunlop's "World headquarters" was located in Grand Island, New York, several miles from the plant in nearby Tonawanda. The Office building was originally built in the 1960s for Hooker Chemical Company which became part of Occidental (Oxy) Chemical. Dunlop took over the property after Oxy and occupied the space until around 2009, when it was abandoned and badly vandalized. The structure sat empty and neglected for several years until it was gutted and restored as a Holiday Inn hotel. The Dunlop plant still has it's Dunlop signage in addition to recent Sumitomo and Falken signage.
Excellent video and appropriate for me as I have a case of Dunlop’s disease. My belly dun lops over my belt. 😮 Fascinating story as always, thanks,
Brilliant. Absolutely splendid .
Worked there as a contractor in the early 90s. The smell of rubber is still stuck in my nostrils today.
Great vid as always - as one of the people who got to drive by the abandoned Fort Dunlop fairly often it was really interesting to hear the history
Me too - the bit about driving by Fort Dunlop was me in the 80s and 90s.
Ahh yes Dunlop tires yes my favorite tires on Jdm cars.
We had a Dunlop Tyre bridge over the Killarney racetrack in Cape Town until quite recently.
I worked in the building where the Blue Plaque is from 1991 to 2017. It was the HQ for Belfast City Council’s IT Department.
Your uploads are always the first from the inbox I watch. I've even stopped on on the way home late at night after work to catch up. I seem to have got quite picky in my other general viewing but love the the knowledge I gain from these videos and really appreciate the hard work I know you must put in to create them.
Thanks - that's quite a compliment! Glad you enjoy them.
It amazes me how many times I've seen dunlop logos in the most unlikely places my p38 range rover's air suspension system has dunlop logos everywhere
There's a joke in danish about going undercover with a false name, an undercover alias: *Dæknavn* - litteraly "covername". *Dæk* is also the danish word for a tire/tyre. So, the joke is about the undercover spy using an alias like Pirelli, Dunlop, Firestone, etc.
Not sure but you might be making sense after the fact. Because in German you have the 'same' word: _Deckname._ But _Deck_ in itself has no reference to tires in German.
@@Dear_Mr._Isaiah_Deringer Want to complicate it more? In swedish, "Däck" can mean both "tire", "tires", A patio, the deck of a boat, and concrete coverings of ex. motorways.
@@Dear_Mr._Isaiah_Deringer Decken means cover in german like the same word täcka does in swedish? That's where it comes from really.
Dunlop aircraft tyres are still going on the same site , the fort
Just wanted to say I really love your mini documentarys , they are properly first class. I think you could branch out to other topics in and around cars...maybe even totally unrelated things too. Cheers for the entertainment ☺
That's what the Little Car channel is all about. Take a look at some of the other videos on this channel!
@@LittleCar ahh I see I thought this was big car didn't realise it was a second channel ...nicely ☺
The old advert at 3.00 min is Dutch and says:
Do not be misled!
Dunlop tyres
They all have this factory logo.
All other tyres are counter fit of the real Dunlop
Thanks!
Soccer is also a British term that the Americans adopted and kept using while it fell out of use in the UK around the 60s and 70s.
Back in the early 80s I purchased a set of Dunlop belted GT Qualifiers for my 1964 Impala SS they were some of the best wearing tires I've ever owned. .
Tyres used to be cheap. That's inflation for you 😉
Don't worry deflation always becomes after a bubble in your tube.
Not just inflation but modern tires are streets ahead of any of those old ones. My father in the 1960's paid 20 bucks for a 'retread'. I just paid $430 for a single replacement cut down in the sidewall by a curb but that tire is not even related to my dad's retread. I can cruise at 140 K without a worry that my car will kill me. My dad could never say the same. Also I should pay more attention to large curbs (Kerbs?).
@@jwrarmstrong Indeed. I was merely making a terrible pun on the word Inflation ☺️
Ha!. Missed that completely.
Spectacular work as always, though I couldn't help but chuckle at "...wasn't the *first* time the pneumatic tire had been invented." It reminds me of how people seem to now universally say "very unique" when "unique" directly translates to "one of a kind." Can't be very one of a kind, can't create for the first time something twice. ;) :) In any case, keep up the great work! Yours is a real gem of a channel with very compelling content.
Thank you!
No mention of the disc brake - the greatest safety innovation on the motor car
Fantastic video, thanks for taking the (probably considerable) time to research and produce it. The 1800-1900 copyright wars and ensuing competition are endlessly entertaining to explore in retrospect. AC-DC, tYres, phone systems, VHS-Betamax (no, wait).
We take tYres for granted these days, it's true, and their performance never ceases to increase, whether the user seeks grip, economy or winter performance.
Chemistry truly is fantastic. Or as any French speaker might say: le plastique c'est fantastique, le caoutchouc ...
Anyway, ramblings over, and let's see who picks up on that one.
Excellent!!!!! :) First class story
Great video! Thanks for the great effort you put into these.
My pleasure Rusty!
No, the British way is the right way because tire can mean to tire of something, tyre is unambiguous 😒
Quite. And the original way of doing something is not always 'the right' way. Since when do Americans get to choose the spellings of British words? Remember this is the same country that spells colour 'color' and pronounces z (zed) as zee. Everyone knows zee is how Germans says 'the'.
@@gilesleggett 😂😂😂
Giles Leggett even in Britain there was a tyre vs tire war and although tire was technically correct but tyre won out
@@o00nemesis00o When was this ? Never read about it anywhere or heard anyone say that before. Also , how is Tire technically correct ?
@@shaunw9270 he explains it at length in the video
Haven’t heard of Dunlop in a long time
Great subject, I never tire
I remember textile belted radials, like Dunlop SP41 and Goodyear G800.
I came home from work ... yes im back and off furlough any switched on my pc and whooped with delight wen i saw you had posted another excellent video.
Thank You (:
I'm glad I made your day Darren!
Anybody who remembers the 90s TV commercial for dunlop with a guy rolling a tyre from hill top and has a best music in that ad ?
I spent the last of my meager student budget on a new set of Dunlop tyres (Australia) in the early 80s, despite being balanced they vibrated badly at 80kmh. Tyre dealer wasn't interested in helping and a couple of years later someone in the industry confirmed that the Dunlop Grand Prix tyre were known to be rubbish. Since then if anyone ever asked me about tyres I advised stay away from Dunlop. And the lesson I learned was that if a product is advertised excessively its probably mediocre.
Interesting video it was good to see the history for the company I work for, I work for what is left from the Dunlop GRG in Manchester which is now under Trelleborg in Czech Republic.
One of your finest 👍
Thanks. I'm pleased with how it came out. I was one of those people driving past Fort Dunlop in the 1980s & 90s.
I enjoy your videos so much! Top quality. Greetings from Greece.
Thank you very much!
I've just found out I'm really old. I remember that Dunlop advert
Me too!
Wow interesting video. Great research and great presentation!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Great video's - really glad I found this channel and it's big brother, I can't imagine what the Dunlop building must have been like when in full swing, I never tire! - of cranking my neck when queued up on that part of the M6 to wonder at it's grandness, even though it's wrapped with Travelodge attire! Dave P
I really enjoy these videos. A fantastic TH-cam channel, and I'll be looking forward to new uploads! Very interesting.
Glad you like them!
I remember as a young man working at a tyre fitting place and this guy drove in with his brand new 7 series beemer, no more than a month old. A puncture was his issue and i said oh oh oh, why you got these tyres on, he said why, i said You Got Dunlop Distorts on you should get them changed. LOL had a good beer that fri eve, this was in along time ago.
Excellent info as always, thank you for the video.
No problem Norman 👍
The word "Tire" is a verb, meaning to exhaust oneself physically and/or mentally, while the word "Tyre" is the *correct* spelling of that part of a wheel for a bicycle, motorbike, car, lorry, bus or any other powered vehicle intended for the road.
I am surprised you didn't mention the interesting reason Fort Dunlop was called 'fort'. Apparently, workers used to come by canal, and when then boat reached the nearest point, the chaps would shout out to the passengers 'for Dunlop'. This was misheard as 'fort', and became so well known that it was adopted.
Thanks for the info
Ah, I assumed everyone knew that story, sorry.
I love the endnote regarding tire/tyre! It's long been my contention that Britain changed its' accent and spellings after the US civil war and the advent of radio, the originals surviving mainly in the the colonies. Consider the archaic West Country accent, and its similarity to modern accents in the southern states. Some Lynyrd Skynyrd lyrics sound like they were written by the Wurzels ('er don't need 'im put 'er down).
Dr. Johnson helped to standardise English in 1750 with his dictionary. I seem to recall the US worked to simplify English spelling soon after the revolution (colour -> color).
While accents evolve, I'm guessing the US accent (and Australian) came from an initial amalgum of local English accents (e.g. West country, London, Irish) that formed a critical mass that all new immigrants copied.
This looks an interesting article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-language_spelling_reform
Superb work as ever
Awesome video. Your channel is great entertainment. Keep up the good work.
Thanks, will do!
I WORKED IN THE IRISH DUNLOP TYRE FACTORY IN CENTRE PARK ROAD IN MY HOMETOWN CORK CITY IRELAND 🇮🇪 THE FACTORY CLOSED IN 1983 A TERRIBLE LOSS TO CORK CITY ALSO FORDS CAR ASSEMBLY PLANT CLOSED IN1984 AN OTHER BIG LOSS TO CORK CITY
In my country Dunlop tire is just a brand made by 1 company that produce other brands too😅
LOVE fun with grammar and spelling at the end :-)
Fantastic as always keep up the good work
Thanks Dan!
"When the Dublin government complained about the smell....." Speaking as a Dubliner there is nothing we complain about more than the smell of things. It's a national pastime.
I am Elias Dunlop I am the next generation to keep the Dunlop generation alive so technically what I’m saying is that he was my great great great grandfather
A neighbourhood in Kolkata is named Dunlop, after the factory.
Again a very interesting vid. Congrats🍻
Glad you enjoyed it
nice pick of a traffic jam in São Paulo at around 4:33, a sole beetle among so many crappy vehicles
The old usage of 'gotten' is not entirely forGOTTEN in UK English. 'Begotten' is still with us too.
Indeed.
2:34 That ad must have given French kids nightmares!
Honda motorcycles came with Japanese made Dunlop tires way back in the 1960's. Were they Dunlop factories, or made by Sumitomo under license?
Another brilliant piece. A documentary piece about a tyre, sorry, tire company should be so tiresome (sic). But you manage to bring it to life. ✊
I worked for dunlop the dudley factory dunlop rim and wheel great company to work for shut down 1980
And John Dunlop has also been immortalised on the Danske Bank £10 note.
You forgot about lindsay in dublin dunlop was one of his friends so dunlop would put his prototype racing tyres on some of lindsays bultaco bikes from his dealership and they raced in the tt isle of man and won on the prototype tyres
The word tyre comes from the metal rim around wooden wheels. The tyre wood(sic) tie the wheel together. So there 🩲!
would this be the case with barrels as well?
@@ImminghamIronhead The rings around a barrel are called hoops
@@danholland2512 Hence the term hoop as used in basketball, which of course now uses a metal rim and net instead of baskets with hoops.
My uncle worked for Dunlop,
Surely Tire is like Tired as opposed to Tyre which means nothing, but tyre, a rubber round thing. So US spelling doesn't make sense as the name of a commercial product.
Love the idea of a person going from his dunlop slippers into a pair of dunlop shoes into a car with dunlop tires to go play tennis with his dunlop racket and dunlop tennis ball
After seeing the name "Dunlop" on everything in the early 2000s, I wondered why. It seemed a tire company was making gym bags, tennis rackets and balls, golf equipment and balls, nuclear reactors, etc. etc. Ok, maybe not reactors but "Dunlop" was on everything.
Interesting story, I didn't know the brand dunlop until my dad got new tires for his car a few weeks ago. I think they were made in vietnam he was told.
Dunlop still has the best bicycle tire valves.
Amazingly I hadn’t really realised Dunlop tyres (or should that be tires?) weren’t really a ‘thing’ anymore. From around 1993, when I had a Maestro, until I sold my 1999 Mercedes C Class in 2013, I favoured Dunlop tyres. The Volvo C30 I traded the Merc for had decent budget rubber, obviously huge diameter alloys by this time with wide treads, the briefly owned Astra SRi that followed it had some other brand rubber on it and now my V40 rolls on Michelin tyres, a brand I grew to hate in the 80s after some balancing problems on a Cavalier and also during my five years driving rigid HGVs, an Iveco Eurocargo I used was also fitted with a new Michelin and at 55mph it was like driving a bouncy castle. Hated it. But I must admit the V40 is fine. This is the first I knew I couldn’t buy Dunlop tyres that are actually Dunlop.
Thanks for the "tyre" versus "tire" explanation. It's nice to see we Yanks got something right for a change. :-)
Yes, but the word "elevator"? It's 4 syllables. Better to use "lift" that's just one. Saying that word in your life is valuable seconds you're not going to get back. 😉
@@LittleCar LOL. Little things do add up!
Especially the spare one around most of our waists📉😎📈
Great episode!
Thanks very interesting, I gotten me some new tires.
Urban Splash did the redevelopment of Fort Dunlop, they also did a good job on the art deco hotel in Morecambe, "The Midland". Both high risk developments.
Everybody knows that the entire world was invented in Scotland!
Including the beer swilling welfare bums
Shame they got pissed and embraced socialism.
@@drummerboy1390 well you guys much like the USA has been the victims of international jewery!
I've got English Irish and Scottish and me some say even a bit of German possibly some French....
I suggest that we join forces and kick some fucking ass!
@Jimmy 83 yes but technically that means that about every English individual would have some amount of German and you know technically probably even French!
Good information and fantastic graphics. However, I got lost in time. The timeline jumped past and future, I lost track.
It was pretty chronological. Try it again!
w00t! go Scotland!, those guys invented almost everything. Thank you
Rachael Lee I’m Scots Irish and for my luck I keep inventing things that already exist......☹️
@@jonnycando It's a constant struggle being an inventor born 100 years too late......
5:10 Dublin *was* in the United Kingdom at the time of setting up the Coventry factory.
16:00 the (to) being understood is perfectly fine in English.
Good timing
Great topic. Bit depressing to cover yet another UK global firm that fell apart amid mismanagement and industrial strife. I was curious about the use of the the brand in various markets around the world.
As a Brit in America particularly enjoyed your outro!
I was chatting to my dad who said that British management was rubbish in the 60s and 70s. Given all the companies I've covered, it seems that was the case!
Drive past the fort most days, still think its a shame Dunlop are no more.
I remembered there was "Dunlop Socks" in the 90's. I don't know if its related.
very intresting
I love your videos. But this one had far too many mid-roll adverts.
TH-cam recently changed their ad policy to place more mid-roll ads on videos by default. It used to be that creators would have to opt-in for them, now they have to opt-out. And it’s not just for new videos, you’ll see the, more on older ones unless the creator specifically turns them off for each vid. Just saying it’s not necessarily a deliberate choice by our host...