Can anyone inform me of the age of these tires? They were on my 41 chevy coupe when I bought it 3.5 years ago and have been holding air ever since. I have searched on Google and can't come up with the info. Any help would be appreciated.
I am guessing they predate age codes. This article might help: http://hunt4cleanair.net/Articles/corvettetiresafety.pdf
OK here we go, don't confuse the serial number with the production number. The production number is all ways 4 digits in American produced tires. This production is marked "DOT" and the first 2 digits are the week of production and the last 2 digits are the year. Thus if the number is 2387 this tire was produced the 23rd week of 1987. Try not to run tires over 10 years old. Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Bottom line, without DOT labeling your tires are pushing at least 35 years old. Before DOT mandated the Uniform Tire Quality Grade Standards (UTQG) there was no standard tire manufacturers used to date when their tires were made. Not sure of the year but UTQG Standards became law somewhere around 1980. The tire date code is at the end of the DOT marking and has been a 4 digit code starting in 2000, the first two digits the week and the last two the year. Before 2000 the date code was 3 digits. Below is a descriptor of the DOT code stolen from the Toyo website:
I think that all of the info guys are providing about tire codes are not going to help you at all. Wild guess....the tires are from the 1970s? or so.
On tires older than 2000, the date code is the last three digits as they ***umed tires would not last over 10 years. Your tires predate the DOT requirements. The ***embly codes is the first two digits of the TIN. On your tires this does not correspond to any current Goodyear plant codes that probably changed when the DOT code was enacted. According to the numbers on your tires they just had their 40th birthday in April of 2014.