Ageing and cracking side walls

[Cyrano]

This is the tyre my 850L had on it when it came over from the US. It's an old Spitfire that had good grip and plenty of tread. It passed 2 MOTs but this year saw it crack up really quick and really bad.



It has since been replaced with a new Metzeler but I did a couple of hundred miles with the old cracked one.

My tyre fitter said it dated from 1990. EEK!

[Burque73]

Mine weren't cracked up but I recently put a couple hundred miles on a set of tires from that time frame too. Seemed to grip ok, but put to the test, would they really? I got scolded by some long timers here to park it and replace them asap, which I did.

[jabcb]

The tires lasted over 20 years but then you converted them to tyres & cracked up really quick. (Sorry.)


More seriously…
I recently used spoons to to demount a tire about that old.
Getting those rock-hard tires off was no fun. So this morning I ordered longer spoons.

[Phred]

That really cracked me up

[robertbarr]

That would kinda indicate that the MOT is still the fleecing 'vehicle' it was in the late 70's when I was over there.

It was just a toss of the dice back then -- whatever the garage felt like 'finding' at fault, well, tough luck. Go to a different garage and pay the MOT fee again, and again...

[Cyrano]

No, my MOT guy is a straight up chap and I've been using him for years. In fact he's just moved to another business and I'll be going there next time.

As I said the tyre appeared in good nick at the time of the MOTs but I think a fast ride to Wales of couple of months ago started the rapid deterioration.