This is a must watch for people with projects that seem to take longer than most like mine. I just checked my tires and found out they were made in 2000!

http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=4826897

That is a pretty good sensationalist story. They are correct about older tires being somewhat more prone to failure. Then again, if you bought a car that had been sitting for 12 years, how many people would take the time to replace the shocks and bushings that would be bad from lack of use?

My project was up on jackstands for most of its life. My tires were stacked in a corner of the shop for at least 4 years.

tires can dry rot and stop holding air. I've had that happen more than a few times.

on the Porsche, it had the same tires on it for 10+ years while it didn't run or wasn't daily driver safe, they never dry rotted but they got very very hard. any bit of a slippery surface or trying to turn too quick and the tires would just slide or spin instead of gripping (made for some interesting full throttle corners) when we finally changed to some fresh rubber it made a huge difference