Lord Melbury

I took out the the spare wheel yesterday and it seems to be original. Never rolled on the road and no marks from wheel nuts. Does anyone know how to read the age of the tire?

Revi

Your tire has "DOT" on it, so it was made in 1971 or later.
This may help, http://anghelrestorations.com/upload...tires_v1.3.pdf

Alan 71

Hi LM,
Based on the Goodyear Tire information contained in the 5th Edition of the NCRS 68-69 TIM&JG....

I 'believe' tires produced after January 1st, 1968 had the DOT letters on their side-wall.

And...

So... UR01808 seems to be

U...1969
R...December

What's the approximate build date on your car?

Regards,
Alan

The paint in the lug-nut holes make it appear the wheel hasn't been mounted on a car.

ed427vette

All I can add is that's a nice 69 dated rim.

Also the Raised While Letter (RWL) tires were not available until sometime during the middle of the year. So if you have an early build date car maybe for example before April 69, that tire would not be original.

62corvette

In your first picture, the orange dot on the tire aligns with the bb dot on the rim. That would be another data point in favor of it being the original.

Lord Melbury

Hi Alan,
It’s dec -69

Håkan

Don Rickles

Nice find!

I'll add that the wheel weight is correctly installed, on the inside rim of the wheel, and is a correctly configured MICRO/BADA winged tipped weight, also correct for the date of the assembly.

Alan 71

Hi Hakan,
Well, if the car is a 'late-ish' December build and the tire was produced early in the month, I'd think it could work!
Regards,
Alan

Don Rickles

The tread surface is interesting to some. Have a picture you can share?

LeeS

Hey Alan, would flight judging actually check the tire for DOT or NON DOT and the tire dates when a 69 is judged? And if so how much of a deduct is it if you have repro wide tread tires?

Alan 71

Hi Lee,
The 4 tires on the car and the spare in the tub are items for which there are Standard Deduction Guidelines for Flight Judges to follow.
Various tires fall into 1 of 8 categories ranging from no deduction to a 100% deduction.
Judges use the information contained in the TIM&JG to help determine what category the tires they are seeing belong in.
I believe the Goodyear reproductions retain more of the available points than the Firestone reproductions.
Do you have access to the Standard Deduction Guide in the Judging Reference Manual, 8th Edition?
If not let me know and I'll send you a copy of the Tires Section of the Manual.
Regards,
Alan

gbvette62

The Goodyear Speedway Wide Tread was one of the two the OEM tires for your car. The other was the Firestone Wide Oval.

According to the C3 Birthday Calculator, your VIN number, 38,214, was built on December 22, 1969, so it's quite possible for it to have tires made in December 69. By the way, your car is also one of the last 69's built. It was only 548 cars from the end of 69 production, .

LeeS

Thanks Alan I would appreciate that, I have a set of 5 NON DOT Goodyear White Letters, brand new, never mounted that I bought in the early 70"s for my 69. Never put them on as I eventually added radials, then joined NCRS in the mid 70"s and always thought I would put these on and eventually have the car judged, but then got smart about dates recently, one is dated in December 69 just like the one mentioned by the OP and the others in March 70 so I realized the dates were incorrect for my car which is a June 69 build, so I'm trying to determine if judging checks the dates, if so not good for me or if judging is just looking for NON DOT which would then make them perfect for me. If the dates get checked I would like to see someone looking for top flight and who has a 70 March/April build get them. They're perfect.

ed427vette

I think there are three OEM tires that could be found on 69's with the third being Uniroyal.

gbvette62

GM did use the Uniroyal Tiger Paw in blackwall and pin stripe white wall, on the Corvette, but was a white lettered Uniroyal ever used on 69's?

maj75

I posted pics of my original UniRoyal Tiger Paw spare tire off my early ‘69. It had the thin white stripe. Nobody makes a repro though

ed427vette

Good point. I don't think I ever saw one. I forgot we were just talking RWL.

Alan 71

Hi Lee,
Am I misunderstanding this DOT thing (?)..... isn't this the DOT stamp on this tire?
Regards,
Alan

Alan 71

Hi,
The 5th Edition of the NCRS TIM&JG mentions that the RWL tires seen on 70-71 cars have been either Goodyear or Firestone.
But, while Uniroyal RWL tires have been seen on a few 72 cars, they remain un-verified.
Regards,
Alan

kenba

My understanding the Goodyear RWL repo tires have a different # of tread rows than the original ones so you lose a few points for configuration.