A word of warning buying them on ebay craigslist etc:

You have no idea how OLD the tire is. afaik the only reason they are so discounted is because the company can't sell them to the general public because 1 it would make them look bad and 2 that pirelli would probably stop doing business with them permanently. they are only allowed to keep tires for so long. while when you get them they may look fine they have the potential to dry rot alot faster then they would have if you got them new.

Also it is the general consensus that you should NEVER use a tire if it'* over 6 years old. if the one you bought is 3 years old well you now have 3 years to use em up. go do some burnouts or autoX...

MOSTLY!!!!! The age of a tire already appears on the sidewall but it'* part of a lengthy code that can be hard to decipher. To find the age of your tires, look for the letters DOT on the widewall. That'* followed by a 12-character serial number made up of numbers and letters, followed by four digits that identify the week and year the tire was made. For example, 2403 would be the 24th week of 2003.

SRS Inc., an auto safety research firm, last year petitioned the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to require easily readable creation dates on car and truck tires. SRS President Sean Kane said that as of November of 2004, his group has documented 37 fatalities and 35 serious injuries associated with age-related tire tread separations. In many of these cases, the tires were unused spares and showed no signs of degradation. Aged tires are often unsuspectingly put into service after having served as a spare, being stored in garages or warehouses, or simply used on a vehicle that is infrequently driven. In many instances these tires show no visible sign of deterioration, and absent any visible indicators, tires with adequate tread depth are likely to be put into service regardless of age, SRS said in its petition. Kane'* petition noted that environmental conditions like exposure to sunlight and coastal climates, as well as poor storage and infrequent use accelerate the aging process.

Ford, which has had its share of about tire safety problems, is urging consumers to replace their tires after six years. Tires degrade even when they're not in use, the company says, echoing the claims of safety advocates who have been pressing federal regulators to take action on the issue.

"Tires are not milk," Rubber Manufacturers spokesman Daniel Zielinski told the Wall Street Journal. But Zielinski'* quip notwithstanding, many European car makers as well as Japan'* Toyota Motor Corp. have long warned drivers that tires are perishable and many use six years as the cut-off point.

DaimlerChrysler'* Mercedes division also tells drivers that tires last only six years and Chrysler now includes a similar warning in its owners manuals.


General Motors so far is the ONLY hold-out. A company spokesman says it hasn't found any research that supports six years as the deadline for replacing tires.


from my close friend:
"Backing up the replacement time limit theory, my late mother'* car ('93 Buick Century, with 34k mi. at the time) still had its original set of good Michelin tires on, with hardly any visible signs of wear. One day we were out driving it and we started to get this thumping sound, with the car kind of shaking (felt through the steering wheel) as if a tire was perhaps almost flat or maybe way out of alignment. I jacked up the front end, rotated each wheel, and on one could see the tread was off center in one area, not straight anymore. I asked her if she had hit any thing large, and she hadn't. We got that tire replaced, thinking it was just a fluke.

About three months later a similar sensation was felt when driving it, and I checked it again and the same physical deformity was evident on another tire. I called Michelin to check it out, and they said then (this was early '04) that we should be replacing tires at six years, and that this was not an abnormal development. So we got the other three replaced with similar tires to the first replacement. I had never heard of this sort of limitation, even though these tires were 11 years old at the time. I suppose if the tires' breakdown had happened while driving 70 mph somewhere that the result could have been catastrophic, so take heed ya'll!"

from my Arizona friend:
"Dry Rot is very common in dry sunny climates. It is a huge problem here in Arizona especially for vehicles parked outside most of the time. In fact, Dry Rot Tires are probably responsible for more accidents than Bald Tires."

put that in your pipe and smoke it

just a word of warning guys good deals can be found but PLEASE check the date the tire was ACTUALLY created on.

Iluvemybonnie, thanks for the advice & the great feedback. I've learnt smothing new today about the degradation of tire quality after a certain period of time.

I would urge moderators to make the above thready a stickie, which would make it more visible & easily accessible by members.

Nice informative read ILMB. I once put some really good looking thick treaded tires that sat in a friends garage for years on my truck. Filled it with flagstone and sure enough one separated. What a pain. Had to unload alot of it on the side of the road to change the tire, the OEM jack wouldn't take the pain. I dont like to sticky without the concensus of the staff, but I will bring it up for discussion.

iluvmybonnie,

Thanks for the information. That is interesting to know. I'd say there are millions of vehicles with 6 yr old tires in service.

Smoking pipe.