Vintage tires
 

Is there any interest in vintage tires? The picture below are my original steel rims for my 68 bird with the tires that were on it when I bought it back in 96. I am going to remove the tires and refinish the rims since I am thinking of putting them back on. I think the tires are from the 70s. I really don't need them cluttering my garage so if these have no interest, they will just go to tire disposal. Granted they are not an OEM tire but just cool vintage.

They aren't safe to drive on and they aren't OE for a trailer queen that isn't driven. I'd say they are worthless, other than wall art.

Well maybe someone living near “Surrounded By Reality“ will come by and take them off your hands for a fairgrounds cruiser.

Day Two fans are out there. If I had a weathered but original paint mid-70s car I'd be all over those. A-Team replica builders would love to find a set of Truck TAs.

They look great but I've had an old tire that looked good blow out at speed and I can tell that you I wouldn't touch 'em or a car that I planned to drive more than 25 mph. It was on a '68 bug and it beat the hell out of that fender. Fortunately, it was on the rear. I expect the results would have been worse if it had been on the front.

Yes, they are pretty much petrified are I would definitely never try to drive on them. They would be just vintage wall art.

Surrounded by reality is Madison, WI area.

I’d do a search and see if they were ever on anything from the factory, even still someone would buy them even just to roll a car around but there’s an a$$ for every seat it’s just how much will that a$$ pay. I had a tire lose its tread on my 69 convertible I had just put my NOS rocker moldings on temporarily until I found a seatbelt driver set . Needless to say it destroyed my rocker molding on That side . Litterlally drove it ONCE w those on it.

If they’re period correct for a hot rod or custom car someone will want them, being safe for highway use isn’t a big issue when you’re just trailering a car to shows or just slowly driving around the fairgrounds.

Here’s a set of General Dual 90 triple thin stripe whitewalls that came on a set of Hurst wheels I bought about 10 years ago. Those tires were definitely the first and only set of tires ever mounted on those wheels so they were close to 50 years old when I removed them.

I sold that set of half-century old tires for $600. The guy who bought them knew I was selling them for display only but he said he was going to cruise around some shows with them on his car.

Use for rollers around the shop? Or throw caution to the wind and use them for smoker tires? I bought some old bias ply tires and plan to burn them down. My 69 GTO quarters are rusty so who cares if they blow. I want to send some smoke signals.

Perfect for that kind of stuff and therefore deserve more than the dumpster. Love those triple whitelines by the way.

I've always thought BF Goodrich should come out with a Radial T/A that uses the original sidewall letter font, for people who are trying to recreate an accurate 'day two' look from the early 1970s.

I had an old TA radial blow out while static in garage, on one of my 68 Birds.
No damage but scary when it happens late at night.

Had a set of Dunlops on my GTO from back in the 80's. The car had not seen a lot of miles in recent years; tires looked great. One day about 8 years ago or so I happened to look at the car and the tread had just peeled off the tire and was lying on the garage floor. Sure, age was extreme, but Sobering thoughts, none the less.

George

They can't even make a tire that the letters don't turn brown.

Old bias ply tires are a whole different ball game than steel belted radials. Old bias plies can blow out and go flat, but don't unravel and tear fenders off of cars. I ran 45 year old tires on my Model T because they were better quality than the Coker stuff that would crack in 6 months. Also ran triple white walls on my '66 Coronet in the late '90's with no issue. A friend runs 73 year old tires on his '26 Model T. Speeds are under 40 mph, though. New tires made today are inferior to tires made even 20 years ago due to the climate change agenda.

I barely drove on these 30 year old tires. The rubber turned into goo just sitting on the garage floor.

One of the 4 Firestone 721 steel belted radials, that are basically new, but made in 1976 and never driven, just blew the tread off sitting in the pile. Looking closely at the tread on the other 'good' tires you can see belt shift as you follow the tread around.

Dennis

I started a "sidewall" collection years ago. They dont take up much space and many are so vintage cool..

I've still got 4 bfg t/a 235/70=14 mounted on 14x7 rally 2s that I bought new in 1988. Just stopped using them 2 years ago. They look great and still have about 1/2 tread. I can't bring myself to throw them out. I bought 15" rims with bfg t/a now.

I had a set of BFG p235/70R14 on 14x7 Rally 2 wheels as well. Bought them in June 1991 (32 Years ago). During an inspection of them a few weeks ago I found fine cracks in the side walls. Even though they had plenty of tread remaining I replaced them. Don’t want to risk a blowout at freeway speeds. Cost for repairing a quarter panel or fender could exceed the cost of a set of new tires.

If the new tires I just bought last another 30 years I’ll be 100 years old. For what it’s worth I bought my 1969 Grand Prix from a private owner 50 years ago this weekend in 1973.

FWIW, steel belted radials are bombs when they get old, bias ply tires with nylon, rayon, or cotton cord are not. They'll get hard and ride rough, or can blow out, but they don't separate like a steel belted radial and destroy body panels.