We "Gearheads" tend not to give much attention to the age of the tires on our "Rides". Since we don't put many miles on them, we think they are alright as long as they look good and have plenty of tread. Not so. The age of our tires is very important and should be given serious consideration. I recently learned the hard way.

The tires on my 1934 Ford Sedan Delivery streetrod looked great, had lots of tread, low mileage, and had no cracks or obvious signs of damage. Yet, at speed, the other day while on a color cruise, the right rear tire suffered a tread separation that could have caused a nasty situation. Luckily, I heard pieces of the tire hitting the fender and was able to slow down, get off the road before the tire was completely destroyed, and avoid any damage to the vehicle. Since I wasn't carrying a spare and it was late on a Sunday afternoon, I had to suffer a long (over 100 miles) flatbed ride/expense to get the vehicle back to my garage. The tire never lost pressure, but was a real mess with shredded steel belt showing on 40% of the tread.

Why did the tire fail? As I found out when replacing the tire (and the other 3 for safety reasons) the tire was 11 years old. Had I checked the tire build code on the tires as part of normal maintenance, I would have realized that the tires were old and needed to be replaced.

The build codes on tires are part of the DOT code printed on the inside sidewall of all tires. They are either the last 3 or 4 digits of the DOT code. If you have only 3 digits, the tire was built before 2000 and should be replaced NOW. 4 digits means the tire was built after 2000. The first 2 numbers in the 4 number series tells you the week the tire was built. The last 2 digits tell you the year the tire was built. Accordingly, a build code of 4507 would tell you the tire was made in the 45th week of 2007. I'm advised by those who know that 5 to 9 years is the normal life of a tire notwithstanding limited use and good looks.

Just a word to the wise — check your tires, guys and gals, and replace the old, unsafe ones ASAP.  

                                                                                                          Take care,

                                                                                                                   Doug