Tire DOT Code - knowing the age of your tires
Drivers will keep their tire pressure in optimum parameters, and make sure that the threads are still good, but most often than not, we overlook the other factor that tells us how good the tire is at holding the car on the road, its freshness.
As tires are made of rubber compound, and rubber tends to get stiffen over time, fresher tire will always yield better grips. As a rule of thumb, never buy tires that are manufactured more than 6 years ago, sitting on the shelves all these while.
Fortunately, the tire manufacture date is stamped on every tire as part of the DOT code. Look out for the 4 digit code (if it is 3 digit, your tire is already way too old, manufactured before the year 2000) stamped on the sidewall of the tire. The first two digits denote the week of birth, and the last two digits describing the year of birth.
In the accompanying picture, then, 3902 means this particular tire was manufactured on the 39th week of 2002. Dividing 39 by 4 (4 weeks a month) gets us 9.x, so it was produced sometimes in September, 2002. Simple as that.
So, next time when you put in new tires, make sure they are still new. If your current set of tires still has good threads left but are already over 6 years since it was produced, consider replacing them.
More info can be found on wikipedia Tire Code
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November 15th, 2006 at 3:30 am
hehe paiseh..never leave comment b4 at ur cars site.
memang keng, know about food n cars. need 2 extras on girls n money then u complete whole set liao.
ky on life(food,cars,girls, n money)..wakkakaa!
July 10th, 2007 at 11:55 pm
This is a great post - people always underestimate the importance of tire maintenance.
July 15th, 2008 at 9:26 am
I just went out and looked for the manufacture date of my Goodyear RS-A 17″ Tires which I purchased 2004. What a surprise - one tire had the manufacturer’s info, but the manufacture DATE was missing; on the other three tires there wa NO manufaurer’s data at all, just blank spots where the info should have been. The one tire with the INFO but with the missing DATE is probably the tire I had to replace a couple of years ago. Why is there NO Manufacturer’s INFO on my tires? Have I been ripped off and been sold OLD tires with the Data removed? If so what is my choice of action (if any)?
July 16th, 2008 at 12:03 am
My husband put new tires on my car. There is a DOT code on the outside of the tire but no code telling me the year. I made calls to Uniroyal and got three different answers. I called Michelin who bought out the Uniroyal and they said the tire I had was not made before September 2007 but they don’t put the year code on the outside of the tire. I was told I had to go back to the dealer and have them take the tire off to see the code on the inside of the tire. This should not be happening today and I don’t have any comfort knowing when the tire was really made.
July 17th, 2008 at 9:17 am
I have a BF Goodrich tire with only 8 digits after the DOT they are AP72 FB21 what does that mean?
July 22nd, 2008 at 3:26 am
I had similar problems too when I recently bought a new set of tires from Goodyear. Apparently, the newer tires put the 4-digit code for the year in the inside part of the tire. This is done so that we will not know the true “vintage” of the tire. The manufacturer does not want us to know.
August 1st, 2008 at 11:46 am
My Michelin Pilot Sport RunFlats are matched pairs (17″ on the front & 18″ on the rear), only one tire in each set has the date code. The pairs each have the same first 8-digit code, but the 4-digit date codes are only on the passenger side tires. Not sure if many tires are build in pairs, but that could definitely affect your date code search if only a single tire was purchased. Good luck.
snpperhd
October 3rd, 2008 at 3:25 pm
The date code is stamped on one side of the tire only. If you have directional tire thread (ie. Michelin Pilot Sport), it will only appear on one side of the car when installed. If you don’t see it from the outside, the date code is on the other side facing into the car.
November 8th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
It is possible that the dates on the tire not match with real dates ? I’ve got a Dunlop 190-65-15 but it does’n match . Please answer me ! Thank you !
November 9th, 2008 at 4:21 am
It is very important to know the ages of our tires, because they can cost the life..all the original tires are the code stamped, so if they don’t have any code don’t buy it..