How old are your new tires?

Just saw this shocking report from 20/20...

http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=4826897

My rule of thumb. If they're older than 7 years based on the date-stamp on the tires they go to the recycling depot. Others laugh at me for doing so, but it's the only thing between you and the road. Tires aren't that expensive especially Kuhmo.

Yeah, now I'm a bit worried to find out how old mine all are...

I'd like to have more information on the specific tires that failed. Are these really cheap (generic) tires that are prone to failure anyway? Would a high quality older tire like a Michelin suffer similar issues?

I installed 4 "new" Michelin Exalto A/S tires in 2008 and 3 were made in 2005 and the 4th made in 2007. I was not as happy as I would like. BTW, I am not real imporessed with the tires in real wet weather.

Mine were made in 2008 or was it 2007.

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Originally Posted by xspeedy

I'd like to have more information on the specific tires that failed. Are these really cheap (generic) tires that are prone to failure anyway? Would a high quality older tire like a Michelin suffer similar issues?

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I don't think they could publicly divulge that without getting a hell of a lawsuit.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Russell

I installed 4 "new" Michelin Exalto A/S tires in 2008 and 3 were made in 2005 and the 4th made in 2007. I was not as happy as I would like. BTW, I am not real imporessed with the tires in real wet weather.

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I just checked my tires which are about 9 months old to me and found them to be either 07 or 08 according to the code. Then I checked my daughters car, I just bought 2 new tires for her car for the front and one of them are 9 years old! The other one was 3 years old. I cant feel good about this now as I didnt know this before. I will be going to discount tire tomorrow to see what I can do about this. I had a friend that just about died along with his family on the highway going to California. His tire just came apart. They too where fairly new to him. They all ended up be flown to the hospital in bad shape. This story ends ok as everyone got better and is well now.

Mostly hoo ha me thinks.
20/20 just loves to alarm people

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ross

Mostly hoo ha me thinks.
20/20 just loves to alarm people

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Yeah, which is why I would like to see more detail. No specifics were given for the tires that failed. If you google on the subject though, there are others that say old tires are more prone to failure. Ford is one of them.

Leads me to wonder if that is related to the Ford Explorer tread separation. Maybe Firestone had a huge inventory of old tires in the required size :)