The History of No-Hub Couplings

No-hub couplings, well-known for their easy installation, revolutionized cast iron drainage pipe installations from a dangerous, skilled craftsman trade, to a simple, fast, safer occupation.

Before the invention of no-hub couplings, hub and spigot cast iron piping would be connected into fittings with hubs or bells by using lead, oakum, melting pots, burners, special clamps, cast iron ladles, joint runners and caulking irons.

All of these tools were required so that plumbers can pour the melted lead into the fitting and get the lead to evenly flow around the entire pipe and seal the fitting properly. This was accepted as the best possible way to join pipe. You not only had to be trained, but also had to have years of practice as first an apprentice and then as a journeyman, before you could be considered as a master plumber in this field.

In the 1950s the residential housing boom came. The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, which came to be known as the G.I. Bill, gave military veterans access to affordable college education. This in turn led to highly-educated, productive employees entering the work force. American businesses were willing to pay top dollars for management and engineering skills. Less expensive oil from domestic wells was helping the engines of industry to move forward. New advances in science and technology improved work place productivity. And since any would-be competitors in Asia and Europe were in the process of recovering from the effects of the devastation brought about by World War II, the US economy flourished, the baby boom had begun and new housing was desperately needed.

With the housing boom in full swing, plumbing and building contractors came to the conclusion that connecting pipes with lead and oakum was no longer cost effective because it required too much time and labor. Builders realized they needed a much faster way to connect pipe and reduce their building costs. The American pipe industry found and created a solution with the shielded no-hub coupling design.

However, new ideas are not always readily acceptable because people tend to be skeptical until something proves to be better. By the late 1960s contractors began to realize the no-hub coupling was not just a "band-aid", but a viable quality product that was indeed solid and secure and was passing the test of time.

The invention of no-hub couplings streamlined the drain pipe installation process tremendously, and with just a 15 minute training period needed, hub and spigot lead and oakum installations soon became a thing of the past.