tires don't age gracefully

[chrycordoba@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

I'm a member of two classic car on-line clubs, one for Imperials and the other 
for Buick Rivieras.  Several weeks ago one of them (I think the Imperial Club) 
had a thread about replacing tires that didn't have much mileage on them, but 
were old or of an indeterminate age.  Let me lend a real-world experience that 
occured today to me.

I also own a '65 Pontiac Bonneville, and am driving it to a show in Dallas this 
week from Washington, DC.  It's a beautiful mint-condition car with about 
110,000 miles, and the Dunlop tires were put on it in 1996, about 19,000 miles 
ago.  At noon I'm cruising along at 65-70 on Interstate 64 in eastern Kentucky, 
when BOOM!!  The rear end of the car started swerving and I saw junks of debris 
in the lane and shoulder behind me.  I got the car to a stop on the shoulder 
and found that the passenger rear tire had experienced tread separation and 
then a blow-out.  I could see the steel belts and the tread was peeling off.  
The debris blew off the fender skirt, but luckily the traffic was very light so 
no one ran over it.  I was able to retrieve it; it only had a severe dent on 
the top and the side pins were bent such that they wouldn't go on the clips on 
the fender.  Also luckily, the factory wire wheel cover didn't come off too.  
The only warning, if that's what it was, was a shimmy at 55-60 that went away 
at 68-70mph.  I thought it was an alignment problem that I'd take care of when 
I got to Dallas.

I called AAA and a guy from the local Shell station in Morehead came out and 
put the spare on.  Lesson #2, guys and gals (#1 is coming up): If you have a 
"new" oldie, whatever it is, check to see if the tire iron matches the size of 
the lug nuts.  Mine didn't (must have been replaced at some point with, er, 
larger nuts!), which is why I had to call AAA.  I AM capable of changing a 
tire!!  I followed the mullet-headed mechanic (that IS the prevailing haircut 
in Kentucky) to his Shell station where, by the grace of God, they had a pair 
of whitewall 205/75R14 and a pair of 215/70R14, a close-enough match to what I 
needed.  They had four guys racing around the car to exhange all four tires, 
and $280 and 45 minutes after arriving, I'm on my way again.  They even bent 
back the clips so the fender skirt would go back on!

I looked more closely at the old tires, trying to read the DOT code to see how 
old they really were.  The numbers didn't make any sense - I think they said 
something like MWK286 - if they were bought in 1996, and I have the receipt for 
them from one of the prior owners.  Perhaps they were used tires, that were 10 
years old then.

And now lesson #1: If you don't know how old your tires are, or they are more 
than 6 or 7 years old, please consider your safety and how much you value your 
Imperial, Riviera, or whatever.  I'm so glad this didn't happen at 65mph on the 
Capital Beltway in heavy traffic.  The fender skirt would have been demolished, 
and probably would have caused more accidents.

Neal Herman
Washington, DC (on the road in Elizabethtown, KY)
1959 Imperial Crown
1965 Pontiac Bonneville
1972 Buick Riviera
1983 Chrysler Cordoba
1997 Buick Riviera