Hi.
The name Englebert probably isn’t the first one to pop into most people’s minds. But for a couple of years in the mid-Fifties, the Belgian-made tire was the one to beat, particularly as it was the tire of choice at the time for Ferrari.
The Englebert Rubber Company took the name of its founder, ex-Belgian army officer Oscar Englebert, when he started the concern in Liège in 1868. The then 31-year-old Englebert was not ready to become a manufacturer at the start, lacking a factory and a permit, but after nine years of just selling rubber products, the company opened a factory in Liège. It turned out all sorts of rubber goods, including pacifiers, raincoats, mats, gloves and conveyor belts for mines. In the latter half of the 1900s, Belgian industrial activity picked up as the country began fully exploiting the vast natural resources of the Congo Free State. Englebert was poised to be there with its industrial rubber, such as those conveyor belts.
Englebert had begun producing tires in 1895, starting with bicycle tires and tubes, and soon following with automobile tires. Englebert got involved in racing in 1899 with the running of the Paris to Amsterdam competition. The durability of the tires impressed the critics, at the very least. And Englebert even landed a contract with Continental to produce tires for the German rubber company. Though some reproduction Englebert tires have been produced over the years, today the name exists on the record books more than anywhere else, a testament to a tire manufacturer that used motor racing almost from the beginning to sell more tires.