[OG68]

A little story regarding old tires. A fellow El Camino club member and I were returning from a weekend meet in Pismo Beach. (about 350 miles from San Diego) 20 miles down the road his front tire suddenly goes flat due to a valve stem failure. He didn't have a spare so I loaned him mine. The spare (General) was in excellent condition with minimal tread wear but was 15 years old according to the date code.
As we were driving through Los Angeles at about 70 mph the tread let go. I was behind him and took a few chunks to the windshield. We made it safely to the shoulder and found the tire was still holding air with 90% of the tread gone. We limped to the next off ramp and luckily found a tire store that was still open at 5:30 on a Sunday evening. Unfortunately they didn't have a tire to replace his original which had sideway damage. But they did have a 14" tire in stock which they mounted to the destroyed spare and we continued on to San Diego without further incident.

His driver front fender was severely damaged and spent 6 weeks in the body shop trying to get it right. I somehow managed to avoid any damage to my windshield.
It only takes one time to prove a point. We were both fortunate that no one got hurt in the busy LA traffic. It could have ended much worse.