Space saver date code help needed

My 70 Cuda was built April 21st of 1970. The space saver I found is date coded the 10 month 14th day of 69. Would this work? If not what date should I be looking for. Thanks for any help.

Ken

where did or how did you find decode info for a pre-'71 BFG tire?

The date code is on the space saver that I have. I will try to post a pic of it for you. What I need to know if this date code will work for April of 1970 built car? or should the date be closer. Thanks for any help.

Ken,

From what I've seen on unrestored 70 Cudas, the dates on original space savers are 30-60 days prior to the SPD for the vehicle. Your spare is 6 months in advance, which will work (theoretically), but having a spare with a date in the late-Feb and March of 70 time frame would be ideal.

Rob

Rob
Thanks for the info. Did you happen to get pics of these date codes. I was trying to see if they were consistent or all over the place.

Ken

Ken,

I will look through my pictures; I do believe I have one pic of the space saver spare in an unrestored 70 Hemi Cuda. I do remember that the SPD on the car was 107 (Jan 07, 1970), and the space saver spare was Dec XX, 1969…I don't remember the specific day on the rim.

The same car also had its original, matching set of 450 rims, which were all dated December 14th 1969.

From the 4 or 5 unrestored survivor 1970s I’ve looked at, they were all within the 60-day time frame, but that doesn’t mean a car was built with a rim dated 60-120 days or more away. I would guess that is possible.

Rob

Rob,

Thanks this info. might help others as well. After 10 years its getting close to done.

Ken

My 8/29 SPD has a 7/1 date space saver.

Tom

My 106 SPD 70 Cuda has a 11-4 69 space saver wheel.

Daryl

The dates you are talking about are from the steel wheel not from the rubber tire. Is that what I am reading here.

I believe so since I believe there is no date on the tire prior to 72

That's correct. We are discussing the date on the rim itself, not the tire.

So if you go by the CHEVY WAY for restoration than around three months before your build date, if you know the exact build date not the SPD. The CHEVY WAY that also is why people think a date code on a motor or block is good for a car with in a certain date or time before the SPD of a car. That is not the Chrysler way ONE motor came with every car and that is the original motor.

I would think date codes for tires and rims would be with in a mouth and a half before SPD baring any kind of delay from the manufacturer such as a strike or a transport accident. How much stock would Chrysler bring into the plant for storage back in 1970-71 and how much was used up per day. You also need to know how much FIFO was using back in the day First in First out.

The spacesaver wheel in my 4-15-70 SPD Challenger T/A is dated 11-14-69.
I can't say it is its original wheel but it is the spare that was in the trunk when I bought the car in 1978 so there's a good chance it is.

Does your door sticker say April or did it leave early? Either way that is a good size gap.

Thanks everyone for the information so far. If more AAR ,T/A or cars built in April / May. could post there date codes would be great. Maybe we can see more of a range this way.

Thanks Ken

That is a big gap, Mastershake340. But to your point that probably is the original space-saver spare in your T/A. I'm sure there are probably many examples of this if we could take a cross-section of cars built in the 1970 model year and develop a chart of space-saver rim date codes vs. vehicle SPD.

I believe the 30-60 day is "general guidance" and not an absolute rule with space-saver date codes relative to SPDs.

My car's door sticker is April 1970.
An unrestored twin 2 VINs past my car was in my area until recently. Too bad it was sold as it would be interesting to see what the date code was on its spare. If I run into the car's former owner I will ask him where his car ended up. Anybody know of a recently purchased unrestored red Mr Norms T/A being bought last year?
Having been an engineer in manufacturing most of my career, I do roll my eyes a lot when I see people trying to nail down what date code part is correct for their car. Certainly there would be an "on average" date, but if you were able to document each and every car right after build, I'm sure you'd find dates well outside of what you'd expect to see.
Keep in mind too, date codes are a quality control thing, they are not like a "use by" date on a box of cereal. No one at the plant cared or paid any attention to what date codes were on the parts they were installing.
I've personally called plants to have some parts sent to me for testing or evaluation, and many months later returned the parts I didn't use to the plant, as an example. I'm sure that happens at most manufacturing plants including Chrysler plants 50 years ago.
Inventory control is pretty good today but parts still end up going to the wrong place from time to time, and it might not be until an inventory months later where things get back where they belong.
I'm sure this situation was worse years ago, before inventories were managed with computer programs, and parts bins labeled with UPC codes etc. I would guess people managed the inventories with hand written ledgers then? "Just in time", "Kanban" etc didn't yet exist 40 or 50 years ago either I don't think, so parts management at plants was more inefficient then.
I work at a truck manufacturer now, and I know trucks come off the line often missing parts, they get towed to a storage lot until the "test and tune" department can fix it, which can take weeks. Trucks are more customized and much more variability than a car plant, but still, I'm sure situations where cars came off the line with missing parts or something else wrong and must be fixed happen now and happened then, all the time, so a part might get installed on a new car weeks after a car's manufacturing date at the plant.
Unless you could go back in time and inspect and document your car at the plant you can never say what date code was on a part on your car. That includes my spare. My car sat at Mr Norms for nearly 10 months before it was sold. Whose to say that in that 10 months, they didn't need a space saver for a car being sold or a customer car being serviced, and took the spare from a car in inventory, which turned out to be the one I eventually owned, and then replaced the spare with another one, the one in there now?
So again, you can document and study this issue to death, but in the end, it doesn't change the fact that any individual car built could have rolled off the plant's grounds for the first time, new, with a part that could be date coded 6 months or more before build, to even a week or several weeks after build.

100% That makes total sense to me.

I guess the real question is: "What dates would be acceptable for the core team of judges that examine and score these cars at national shows?" Since one of the main purposes of having a date-coded part (for some of us) is to demonstrate that your car is similar to how it was delivered from the factory. So would the judges deduct points for having a part outside their accepted "norm" of build dates? Or, is it acceptable to have a part installed that was prior to the SPD? If the judging team adheres to a date range for parts, then you’d have to be within that specific range for the part to be acceptable. Otherwise, anything in advance of the SPD will work.

It may make more sense to understand how the part will be graded, especially since I know Ken is going for an O.E. Gold certification.

I can reiterate what shake said. I have over 25 years in Manufacturing Engineering in numerous industries. It's not uncommon for someone to say "Hey we found a two year old pallet of Widgets and we need to use them up or else I'll get my ass chewed for scrapping X amount of dollars". If the parts are still good you use them. You don't care about the date on them.

My observation is that there is an accordion effect with date codes. At the beginning of the year they are pretty close. As you get farther in the year they get father apart, more variability. I think this is even worse in 71.

As for chasing date codes (i do it) I wouldn't worry to much about it. If someone actually questions you on your date codes just ask to see there car then this will happen:

98% of the time they won't have a car or a car of any significance or with most of it's correct parts

1.9999% of the time their car is just as varied as your car

0.0001% of the time you will have met an imaginary character because this guy doesn't really exist.

Enjoy your car and try get as close a date as you can but don't sweat it.

That's what it boils down to, you are restoring a car to what the judges will be looking for. And unless there is a published judging standards guide, you won't know for sure what the judge is looking for until your car gets judged and you get to review what you got dinged for on the judging sheet.
Saddest part is that the judges aren't always right, and even a judging guide, if published, may not be 100% correct, so you may have to do something incorrectly in order to "win"!

Morty426 is so correct. Worked in Automotive manufacturing all my working life. I worked in the Rim and Tire room for about 7 years in a row. We had about 1/4 of a skid of spare rims sit on a lift to be picked for three years with none being used. It was to far down the line for the workers and no one moved it to the easier spot that the rims should be. After three years of walking by these spare tire rims I got it moved to were the worker could pick the rims and put them on the line to have tires mount. In 35 years when someone wants to restore these vehicles they will say that their build date is three years after the dates on the rims and will be shaking their head trying to figure it out. The longer a plant uses the same material the longer extra parts lay around and sometimes they get found and put on the line months and years later.

I also bought a spare rim with tire not to long ago. It is an Orange rim and the owner that I bought it from said if was original from his 1971 Challenger trunk. I really only wanted the tire to change over to Black Chrysler spare rim. After I bought this I talked to another person that said he had the same thing with his 1971 Challenger Convetible an orange spare rim. I always thought these rims were for a AMC but maybe there was a time in 1971 that Rims got screwed up and Chrysler got these rims and used them. I still do not believe that the orange rims were in the trunk of a 1971 Challenger Convertible but who knows.

Hmmm.

I have an orange rim somewhere

The date on the orange rim would be interesting to know...

I agree. What is the date on that rim, and what type of tire was on it?

There is also a number and letter in the center of the hub that goes along with the date code.

Ken

I will have to go out and see if I still have the Orange Rim. I know I still have a Ford Spare Rim with a bad tire laying around and will look at that rim also.

Orange Rim

Beside the valve stem has two opening one with a white cap on the one with an outer thread. Rim has 11 on the left and 5.0 on the right, 5.0 likely the rim width. Can not see any other stamps around the valve stem. The rim looks like the kind that has the raised spots around the wheel stud holes much like a 66-69 rims have. There is no flat area around the wheel stud holes. The rim is Orange only on the outside of the rim and black on the backside. There also is BF Goodrich stick on the rim telling you how to put it on and inflate it. On those Raise parts of the rim between the wheel stud holes there are stampings SH and M and 11 and the other could be K1 or K2 or K3 with a 4 under it. The number after the K might mean the year. I believe the tires size that was on the rim was F78-14 and under this number it said replaces 7.75-14. I do not think it is a Chrysler rim but weird things happen and who know if they just shipped AMC rim to Chrysler by mistake or some other reason and they got used up. This rim I think is an AMC rim but someone else might know.

That is an AMC rim....is there a tire on or off the rim ?
Not saying it didn't happen, but I've yet to see an F-78-14 space saver tire on a 5 inch rim, E78-14 replaces 7:35-14, yes.
E-body F78-14 or 7:75-14 space saver tires were on flat faced 5.5 rim so could be used on a disc brake system if needed.

I believe we had this talk in our many travels in my truck Mr.M.The tire is a F78-14 like I told you last year, when you asked if it was a E, we both said that was a Chevy size an E. Next I am going to go and look at the piece of crap out in my scrap bin that I believe if off a Mustang and has a tire on it a 78-14 I believe and will write down all the stampings and stuff. Ya I have not got my Camera fixed yet to take a picture of these rims. The Mopar spare rims you and I bought years ago are 5.5s. I still need to drive to your house and have all those Spare tires and rims changed around, but who needs a spare tire when you are running 14x32s and 3 inch wide skinnys on the front. Dont have to worry about Disc brakes either, Challenger does have that luxury, four wheel drums. I will one day have to try this Orange rim that I believe is an AMC Rim on a Disc Brake E Body to see if it will go over the caliper.

D78-14 AMC, F78-14 Mopar, Ford and the orange rim I have and some others, E78-14 Chevy and Ford. Might be other Manufactures that fall into each size or tire. This is just a bit of information I came across on the net in the last 30 minutes. Seems like other brand X groups are having some of the same questions come up with this type of Spare tires and rims.

The other rim that looks a lot like a Ford Rim has a yellow sticker on it that is very hard to read but I can not find a Auto manufacture on the label. It is a rusty rim and I do not see any stampings on it. The tire is F78-14. It has in big letter on the tire Temporary Use Only. Also has two valve stems maybe two inches apart. I was told it came out of a Mustang.