Brakes don’t stop the car. Tires do. And the tires on our 1984 Porsche 911 Carrera, we admit, had gotten way too old.
How old? More than a decade.
Tire Rack, one of the biggest retailers among the car enthusiast community, says the lifespan of a tire is six to 10 years.
Our own testi…
A lot has happened since the article originally ran. Read it with curiosity when originally ran, but since came across a nice barn hoard and actually need tires for 60's, 70's and 80's cars. Kismet! I thought, but the manufacturers have dropped many sizes, or stopped altogether making "classic" tires. Oh well, Coker has those nice tires for wooden spoked rims...
I have noticed that the availalbe retro tires can come and go but no luck for your needs?
'70s-'80s era period correct sizes are such a niche market apparently that finding decent performance street tires is nearly impossible, especially for 15s in American car sizes (i.e. 235-245/60r15 or similar). Most of what is available are over-priced under-performers... Radial T/As? Cooper Cobras? Kinergy STs? Mastercrafts? Etc. Really?! Alternatively, apparently you can get expensive period replica tires of unknown performance via Coker and such. But again, really? These are our options? I had heard good things about the Vitour Galaxy R1 GT, but they've essentially gone out of stock everywhere this year. Instead, many of us will be forced to run larger diameter wheels just to have decent tire selection. Sigh.
Yeah, sticky, fast 15s for classic muscle/pony cars can present a challenge. We recently ran into something similar regarding our Shelby GT350. Read about fitting tires to the Shelby here.
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