I have a '95 Z28, 11,000 miles with the original Goodyear 235/55R16 Eagle GA tires. No sidewall dry cracks, some cracking between the treads but not deep. I knew tires back in high school working for Goodrich (1972), but I don't recall much on how long you should run older tires. Seems to me 7+ years is about enough. I read recently about a guy running 20 year old tires without issue, but I'm not so sure that's a good idea, especially at highway speeds obviously.

Any thoughts are welcome, going to be expensive putting new rubber on this beast, but I'd likely upgrade to the Goodrich G-Force 245/50R16s. Can't find white lettered tires anywhere in these sizes. Thanks in advance!

 

I wouldn't run anything older than about 5 years on a performance car that I might go high speeds in and 20 years? well hell no on anything!

 

In PA any dry rot will fail state safety inspection. It may be fine in a normal situations but in a emergency situation at 70 MPH it may not be ok.

I have seen a lot of Youtube videos of rescued cars running on old tires and everything was fine. But I have seen a few that ended badly.

Keep in mind just because one or two people do something it does not mean it is statically significant. Yea I could drive on old tires and never have an issue or the first time I take it on the highway a semi rim could fly out of the back of a scrap truck and I slam on the brakes the front tread rips off the passengers side and bam I am in the divider. ( Oddly specific dont you think )

 

New tires it is, thanks for the input. FYI, from additional reading I've done 6 years is about "normal", 10 years it's time to replace if not sooner.

 

I replace my tires if they are older than 10 years, as the rubber gets hard, and they are suseptable to tread separation. This is even worse than a blow out.

If I were in your shoes, given the age of the car and the low mileage, I'd buy new wheels and tires and store the originals.

 

Thanks, not a bad idea, except I’m planning to put the car up for sale soon, so no need to invest in new wheels. Finding tires in the sizes noted earlier has been a challenge, and no raised white letters anywhere that I’ve found. Strange. Probably I’ll just leave the originals on board and let the new owner make those calls.

 

Factory tire size should be P245/50ZR16.