Okay, I gotta fess up, I did something cheap. First, a little back story. My uncle recently died, and I'm inheriting his 2016 Colorado. I've been putting it into the vehicle rotation, but last week, the right rear tire went flat in the yard. It coincided with a sudden temperature swing, so thinking that might've had something to do with it, I pumped it up. But, it slowly went flat again.
This past Saturday, I jacked it up and pulled the tire off. It had what looked like a sheetmetal screw in the tread...basically one of those bolts that has a large flange around it, so it makes it more likely to stand pointy-end up, and pierce the tire. Well, I also noticed a pretty big gash that went from the edge of the tread onto the sidewall. My uncle bought the truck new in 2016, and these are the OEM tires, so I figured the tire is toast.
Well, today I ran to BJs, hoping to drop the wheel off, get a new tire, and pick it up whenever. They were incredibly short-staffed though, and didn't even want to deal with me. So, I was about to just run it to my regular mechanic, and ask him to order a tire and put it on, but then I remembered a place near my house that sells used tires.
Looking online, I figured getting this tire done, with a new tire, would be around $225-250...good LORD tire prices have gone up! But, I rolled into the used tire place, and the guy took one look at it and said "$120, plus tax and such". So, for $137 total, I ended up with what looks like a good used tire. And yeah, I know I'm taking a bit of a chance, but it's not like I'm taking this truck auto-crossing, or trying for a new speed record.
Here's one thing I can't figure out, though. The date codes on the OEM tires on my uncle's truck all read "0816." How in the hell did August 2016 tires end up on a truck that he bought in June of 2016?!
At least, I'm presuming that "0816" is the date code for "August 2016?" I couldn't find any other 4-digit numbers on the tires.