There's a couple of fairly fast corners at the 'ring though which, if they have the same sort of kerbs, could cause problems.
Bear in mind, as well, that it's a shorter track than Silverstone (IIRC) so they'll be doing more laps and, as a result, actually going over those kerbs more often than they were at Silverstone.
Be interesting if there are any shennanigans at the YDT by the teams who aren't keen on changing the tyres.
According to the Beeb the FIA have now ratified the change to the regulations which means they don't need unanimous consent from the teams to change tyre construction mid-season so that from Hungary they will go back to the 2012 spec tyres. Also at the next race they will return to the kevlar construction for the rears which will change the operating temperature which is what the 3 teams had objected to before. Those teams are not going to be happy. The FIA are really reaping the whirlwind for mucking about with the tyres too much. I can see some teams who are badly effected by these changes taking action against the FIA. What a bloody mess. If I were Pirrelli I'd be considering suing the FIA because all of this cannot be good for their reputation and may translate into lost sales and none of it is really their fault.
There's a couple of fairly fast corners at the 'ring though which, if they have the same sort of kerbs, could cause problems.
Bear in mind, as well, that it's a shorter track than Silverstone (IIRC) so they'll be doing more laps and, as a result, actually going over those kerbs more often than they were at Silverstone.
Be interesting if there are any shennanigans at the YDT by the teams who aren't keen on changing the tyres.
One thing that surprised me about the Silverstone race, was that drivers were told to stay of the kerbs, as it maybe what was causing the problem. Yet not many did, then they complained about how dangerous it was. Well if you listened to your team then it wouldnt have been as dangerous. I know drivers are programmed to take a certain line, and its hard to change. Yet they all manage to do it (avoid the white lines) when it rains.
I would assume the teams will tell the drivers, avoid the kerbs at the high speed corners in Germany as well. We will see if they listen, this time.
This being F1, you can bet there will be shenanigans, by most of the teams, not just the ones that dont want changes. I think they must realise, that the tyres will be changed after Germany. There is nothing they can do to stop that.
On a side note. Kimi wasnt happy with the teams call about the final pit stop. If the change in tyres, means Lotus end up slipping further down the grid, I can see him leaving. Especially when a team like RB want you.
According to the Beeb the FIA have now ratified the change to the regulations which means they don't need unanimous consent from the teams to change tyre construction mid-season so that from Hungary they will go back to the 2012 spec tyres. Also at the next race they will return to the kevlar construction for the rears which will change the operating temperature which is what the 3 teams had objected to before. Those teams are not going to be happy. The FIA are really reaping the whirlwind for mucking about with the tyres too much. I can see some teams who are badly effected by these changes taking action against the FIA. What a bloody mess. If I were Pirrelli I'd be considering suing the FIA because all of this cannot be good for their reputation and may translate into lost sales and none of it is really their fault.
That's pretty disappointing and kind of hands the title to Vettel for me... shame.
According to the Beeb the FIA have now ratified the change to the regulations which means they don't need unanimous consent from the teams to change tyre construction mid-season so that from Hungary they will go back to the 2012 spec tyres. Also at the next race they will return to the kevlar construction for the rears which will change the operating temperature which is what the 3 teams had objected to before. Those teams are not going to be happy. The FIA are really reaping the whirlwind for mucking about with the tyres too much. I can see some teams who are badly effected by these changes taking action against the FIA. What a bloody mess. If I were Pirrelli I'd be considering suing the FIA because all of this cannot be good for their reputation and may translate into lost sales and none of it is really their fault.
Yeah, some people will be quick to jump on the Pirrelli bandwagon but really, the FAI are the ones that decide what tyre they want to use and obviously they wanted something to make the action more 'exciting', as has been said they could easily make a tyre that requires not a single pitstop, really, the sky is their limit.
Blame the stupid FIA and their stupid rules for this farce.
According to Sky, teams were running around 16-17 PSI, once the problem started some of the teams (although it may have been all of them) increased the pressure to 19 PSI. This was not forced by Pirelli, but was recommended. Obviously teams were not happy about doing this, as it increased the ride height of the car, and it meant they lost some lap times. RB did increase the pressure, as there was a radio message we heard telling Vettel of the increase in tyre pressure.
Actually what 'Sky' said on the subject was that Pirrelli recommend a pressure setting for each race (at Silverstone it was 16-17 PSI) but that it's up to the individual teams' tyre technicians to decide what pressure to use and that typically they would under-inflate the tyres to increase the contact patch and increase traction. I don't think there are any regulations covering tyre pressures so we really have no idea how low some teams may have been running the tyres and if that may have been a factor. I wonder if the teams would even volunteer that information to Pirrelli?
Actually what 'Sky' said on the subject was that Pirrelli recommend a pressure setting for each race (at Silverstone it was 16-17 PSI) but that it's up to the individual teams' tyre technicians to decide what pressure to use and that typically they would under-inflate the tyres to increase the contact patch and increase traction. I don't think there are any regulations covering tyre pressures so we really have no idea how low some teams may have been running the tyres and if that may have been a factor. I wonder if the teams would even volunteer that information to Pirrelli?
One thing that surprised me about the Silverstone race, was that drivers were told to stay of the kerbs, as it maybe what was causing the problem. Yet not many did, then they complained about how dangerous it was.
S'funny, I was looking at that too.
At one point, after the shit hit the fan, Hamilton was following di Resta and you could see that Hamilton was staying off the kerbs while di Resta wasn't and, at Copse, di Resta just romped off into the distance and left Hamilton for dead.
The TV director went back to that fight a few times and, 5 minutes later, you could see Hamilton running wider and wider until he was, once again, taking the same lines as di Resta, at which point he passed him.
It's kinda like I said before, about FIFA making it an offence to burst a football by kicking it too hard.
You'll never get players to deliberately kick the ball so softly that it definitely won't burst because it's likely that'll put them at a disadvantage to a player who's willing to kick the ball harder.
Instead, they'll all just kick the ball as hard as possible and hope it doesn't burst.
And, obviously, in both cases the fundamental reality is that sportsmen shouldn't be required to use equipment that might not be capable of withstanding use within their sport.
Actually what 'Sky' said on the subject was that Pirrelli recommend a pressure setting for each race (at Silverstone it was 16-17 PSI) but that it's up to the individual teams' tyre technicians to decide what pressure to use and that typically they would under-inflate the tyres to increase the contact patch and increase traction. I don't think there are any regulations covering tyre pressures so we really have no idea how low some teams may have been running the tyres and if that may have been a factor. I wonder if the teams would even volunteer that information to Pirrelli?
Funnily enough Pirrelli have now released a statement blaming the teams of exactly what I said plus running the tyres at extreme cambers and also running the rears on the wrong sides. Apparently every single tyre that failed in the race at Silverstone was being run on the wrong side. Pirrelli are squarely laying the fault for Sunday at the teams' door. They are saying they need more control over how the tyres are used once in the teams' possession i.e. that the recommendations they make about use are actually followed. Should make relations with the teams nice and happy going forward!!!
At one point, after the shit hit the fan, Hamilton was following di Resta and you could see that Hamilton was staying off the kerbs while di Resta wasn't and, at Copse, di Resta just romped off into the distance and left Hamilton for dead.
The TV director went back to that fight a few times and, 5 minutes later, you could see Hamilton running wider and wider until he was, once again, taking the same lines as di Resta, at which point he passed him.
It's kinda like I said before, about FIFA making it an offence to burst a football by kicking it too hard.
You'll never get players to deliberately kick the ball so softly that it definitely won't burst because it's likely that'll put them at a disadvantage to a player who's willing to kick the ball harder.
Instead, they'll all just kick the ball as hard as possible and hope it doesn't burst.
And, obviously, in both cases the fundamental reality is that sportsmen shouldn't be required to use equipment that might not be capable of withstanding use within their sport.
I understand why drivers didnt listen to the teams, and carried on driving over the kerbs. However then they shouldnt complain about how dangerous it was. The drivers made it more dangerous, by going over the kerbs. so why complain - you made it more dangerous?
What use are the kerbs these days anyway? They are designed to keep the cars on the track through the corners but just get used as part of the track. Take them away and I bet the drivers wouldn't risk putting a wheel on the grass.
Funnily enough Pirrelli have now released a statement blaming the teams of exactly what I said plus running the tyres at extreme cambers and also running the rears on the wrong sides. Apparently every single tyre that failed in the race at Silverstone was being run on the wrong side. Pirrelli are squarely laying the fault for Sunday at the teams' door. They are saying they need more control over how the tyres are used once in the teams' possession i.e. that the recommendations they make about use are actually followed. Should make relations with the teams nice and happy going forward!!!
If that is the case, why is Pirelli changing the construction on the tyres for Germany, and for future races reverting back to the 2012 tyres? Just get the FIA to force teams to stop swapping tyres and get them to run at a minimum PSI. Any team that does not confirm to these changes will be disqualified. Or are Pirelli trying to safe face, and shift the blame to the teams. I would guess its a bit of both.
I think the best way forward, is for Pirelli to use kevlar rather than steel in the constructions. The teams to stop swapping tyres, and to use a minimum PSI for their tyres set by Pirelli. This has to be better than reverting back to 2012 tyres.
I understand why drivers didnt listen to the teams, and carried on driving over the kerbs. However then they shouldnt complain about how dangerous it was. The drivers made it more dangerous, by going over the kerbs. so why complain - you made it more dangerous?
TBH, I doubt that many drivers would complain about how dangerous it was, per-se.
What they're complaining about is the fact that they're pretty-much forced to do something potentially dangerous in order to be competitive, especially when it would, apparently, be possible to alleviate that risk by revising the tyres.
let's face it, F1 already bans drivers from putting all 4 wheels off the track but they all do that, not to cut corners but simply by running wide on the exits of corners, so they can carry more speed through a corner.
Would you really want F1 to become so safety-conscious that every instance where a driver leaves the track was penalised?
Cos, if you're going to tell drivers that they can't put any wheels on a kerb for safety reasons you're going to have to make that a rule too AND you're going to have to enforce it so harshly that no driver would risk the penalty for doing it.
Seems like it'd be far simpler to just give them tyres strong enough to deal with a bit of abuse from kerbs, just like suppliers have managed to do for the last 50-odd years.
If that is the case, why is Pirelli changing the construction on the tyres for Germany, and for future races reverting back to the 2012 tyres? Just get the FIA to force teams to stop swapping tyres and get them to run at a minimum PSI. Any team that does not confirm to these changes will be disqualified. Or are Pirelli trying to safe face, and shift the blame to the teams. I would guess its a bit of both.
I think the best way forward, is for Pirelli to use kevlar rather than steel in the constructions. The teams to stop swapping tyres, and to use a minimum PSI for their tyres set by Pirelli. This has to be better than reverting back to 2012 tyres.
The change to tyre construction is to resolve the delamination issue, not the puncture issues from last weekend. Pirrelli are saying that the way the teams use the tyres in conjunction with the unusually high speed left handers at Silvertone and the sharp back-edge of the kerbs on those corners was responsible for the failures on Sunday. They are suggesting that if the teams used the correct pressures, camber and used the correct tyre on the correct side there wouldn't have been any punctures.
That just leaves us with the delamination problem... so as you say, the question is why are Pirrelli having to react to an un-connected issue with a new tyre construction which will resolve the delamination issue which they thought they had already solved? Presumably because they wanted to re-introduce the kevlar belt all along but had been blocked by the three teams so used this half-measure of changing the adhesive. Now they see an opportunity to force through the kevlar change and at the same time save face by blaming the teams for last weekend hoping that the general public don't see the difference between the two situations.
I wonder what sort of guidelines, if any, the teams have with regard to how the tyres are set up?
I mean, if Pirelli design a tyre and say to the teams "Here's the tyres and they're designed to work at 19 psi with up to 5° of camber" and the teams go away and decide to use them at 16psi with up to 8° of camber then Pirelli have a point.
However if Pirelli say "The tyres are designed to work at between 15psi and 20psi and with anything up to 10° of camber" and the teams find that they work best at 16psi and with 8° of camber and then Pirelli say "Oh, wait, they're a bit fragile at the limits so you need to run higher pressure and less camber" then a team could, quite reasonably, say "Hang on, we built a f**king car to suit the info' you gave us and now you're telling us we have to compromise our car because your tyres can't work as you originally said they would" then really Pirelli needs to provide the tyre that they originally promised.
Must say, the thing regarding swapping tyres across the car seems like a no-brainer. That should simply be banned.
Of course, it wouldn't hurt Pirelli to ask themselves how they've ended up with a tyre that works better on the "wrong" side of the car either.
TBH, I doubt that many drivers would complain about how dangerous it was, per-se.
What they're complaining about is the fact that they're pretty-much forced to do something potentially dangerous in order to be competitive, especially when it would, apparently, be possible to alleviate that risk by revising the tyres.
let's face it, F1 already bans drivers from putting all 4 wheels off the track but they all do that, not to cut corners but simply by running wide on the exits of corners, so they can carry more speed through a corner.
Would you really want F1 to become so safety-conscious that every instance where a driver leaves the track was penalised?
Cos, if you're going to tell drivers that they can't put any wheels on a kerb for safety reasons you're going to have to make that a rule too AND you're going to have to enforce it so harshly that no driver would risk the penalty for doing it.
Seems like it'd be far simpler to just give them tyres strong enough to deal with a bit of abuse from kerbs, just like suppliers have managed to do for the last 50-odd years.
Your argument is one side of the coin. I can see also see the other side, which is (the Lotus/Force India) stance. They will say we have developed a car, that doesnt cause heavy wear on the tyres. To achieve this we have had to compromise on speed. The tyres are perfectly safe - we dont have a problem with them. Other teams have designed their cars that cause heavy wear on their tyres, but they have gained an advantage in being able to run faster. It seems there way was wrong - tough on them.
I think whats happened is that most of the teams have got it wrong and not thought too much about what the new tyres would have meant - they pushed the envelope and are now paying the price for pushing it too far.
The dilemma the FIA (did) have, is that they can say to the teams, most of you messed up with the design of your car. So we will give you a pass, and change the tyres. Which sticks two fingers up at the likes of Lotus/FI and says although you were clever enough to cope with the tyres, tough. Or would they say to the others teams, tough you messed up with the design. You will have to make an extra pit stop and/or drive a bit slower to make it to the end of the race. It seems the FIA have sides with the big teams and said we will give you a pass.
Lets face it these tyres are safe, if the teams made their away around the track at no more than 100mph, there would be no problems. However this will ruin the spectacle for the fans, and no doubt cost the FIA lost revenue. The teams want to be competitive so will continue to ignore the recommendations by Pirelli and push, just so they can be competitive. If a tyres delaminates, they can cry about safety etc.
From a personal point of view, I would rather the FIA say, we are not changing the tyres, you can run the tyres however you want. However the first time you have a delamination, you then have to run the tyres as recommended by Pirelli i.e. higher PSI and no swapping. That way the teams like Lotus/FI wont be penalised for coming up with a design that works. Teams would then actually force their drivers from running over the kerbs, and will make the additional pitstop if required. However I appreciate this wont be as exciting for the fans. Then again neither was seeing Brawn run with the double diffuser and see Button runaway with the title. Penalising a team for solving a problem (in this case the tyres) is wrong in my book.
Your argument is one side of the coin. I can see also see the other side, which is (the Lotus/Force India) stance. They will say we have developed a car, that doesnt cause heavy wear on the tyres. To achieve this we have had to compromise on speed. The tyres are perfectly safe - we dont have a problem with them. Other teams have designed their cars that cause heavy wear on their tyres, but they have gained an advantage in being able to run faster. It seems there way was wrong - tough on them.
I think whats happened is that most of the teams have got it wrong and not thought too much about what the new tyres would have meant - they pushed the envelope and are now paying the price for pushing it too far.
Do you really think that Lotus and ForceIndia wouldn't have made their cars faster if they could?
FI, in particular, has made a career out of building plodding cars and creeping into the bottom end of the points by doing as few pitstops as possible.
It's like entering a diesel Astra in a sportscar race when everybody else has Porsches and Ferraris and then, when it turns out that the tyres burst at over 100mph, the Astra team saying they're quite happy with the tyres while the Porsche and Ferrari drivers whine about how crappy the tyres are.
Sure, you can take that route if you want but then it really does become "Formula Tyresave" rather than a competition between teams seeking to build the best racing car possible and drivers seeking to drive them as fast as possible.
Do you really think that Lotus and ForceIndia wouldn't have made their cars faster if they could?
FI, in particular, has made a career out of building plodding cars and creeping into the bottom end of the points by doing as few pitstops as possible.
It's like entering a diesel Astra in a sportscar race when everybody else has Porsches and Ferraris and then, when it turns out that the tyres burst at over 100mph, the Astra team saying they're quite happy with the tyres while the Porsche and Ferrari drivers whine about how crappy the tyres are.
Sure, you can take that route if you want but then it really does become "Formula Tyresave" rather than a competition between teams seeking to build the best racing car possible and drivers seeking to drive them as fast as possible.
Of course Lotus and FI would have made their cars faster of they could. But they would then have (probably) had higher tyre ware. So they found a compromise between tyre wear and speed. I tend to agree with you about FI, it seems as they have just lucked into the situation, due to lack of budget/resources to push the envelope. But Lotus on the other hand, I think the made a concious decision to go the route they have.
I agree with you it does become "formula tyresave", and its not what the fans want to see. But is it any worse than "Formula Double Diffuser" (2009) or the "Formula Adrian Newey" (that 2011 was), or "Formula Schumacher/Brawn/Todt/Bryne" (early to mid 2000s)? There will always be a "Formula xxx", with the exception of possibly last year. Although Newey brilliance did come the fore towards the end of the season.
I agree with you it does become "formula tyresave", and its not what the fans want to see. But is it any worse than "Formula Double Diffuser" (2009) or the "Formula Adrian Newey" (that 2011 was), or "Formula Schumacher/Brawn/Todt/Bryne" (early to mid 2000s)? There will always be a "Formula xxx", with the exception of possibly last year. Although Newey brilliance did come towards the end of the season.
Yeah but there's a difference between a situation where a couple of teams are just flat-out better than all the rest and the current situation where most of the current teams are better than the tyres they're using.
Again, my opinion really depends on how the tyres were originally specified.
IF the teams are deliberately running the tyres out of spec' then, sure. It's their own fault and they need to change their cars.
If, OTOH, they're just running tyres near the limits of the original spec' and now Pirelli are saying that's not safe then Pirelli have an obligation to make better tyres.
Unless I'm mistaken, after Spa last year - where RBR were found to be running tyres out of spec' and had massive tyre wear, it was written into the rules that all teams MUST run their tyres in compliance with the supplier's specifications so I'm thinking it's probably the latter situation.
The change to tyre construction is to resolve the delamination issue, not the puncture issues from last weekend. Pirrelli are saying that the way the teams use the tyres in conjunction with the unusually high speed left handers at Silvertone and the sharp back-edge of the kerbs on those corners was responsible for the failures on Sunday. They are suggesting that if the teams used the correct pressures, camber and used the correct tyre on the correct side there wouldn't have been any punctures.
That just leaves us with the delamination problem... so as you say, the question is why are Pirrelli having to react to an un-connected issue with a new tyre construction which will resolve the delamination issue which they thought they had already solved? Presumably because they wanted to re-introduce the kevlar belt all along but had been blocked by the three teams so used this half-measure of changing the adhesive. Now they see an opportunity to force through the kevlar change and at the same time save face by blaming the teams for last weekend hoping that the general public don't see the difference between the two situations.
It's all a bit of a mess.
The problem with the tyre situation, is that everyone is blaming everyone else. So you dont get the true picture. As Si alluded to, Pirelli should publish under what conditions they said there tyres would work under. Then we can start to get a picture of where the problem lies. Although since Pirelli are changing the materials and process used to make future tyres, you have to think that the problem lies with them rather than what the teams are doing.
I think all fans, regardless of who you support will agree its a mess.
Yeah but there's a difference between a situation where a couple of teams are just flat-out better than all the rest and the current situation where most of the current teams are better than the tyres they're using.
Again, my opinion really depends on how the tyres were originally specified.
IF the teams are deliberately running the tyres out of spec' then, sure. It's their own fault and they need to change their cars.
If, OTOH, they're just running tyres near the limits of the original spec' and now Pirelli are saying that's not safe then Pirelli have an obligation to make better tyres.
Unless I'm mistaken, after Spa last year - where RBR were found to be running tyres out of spec' and had massive tyre wear, it was written into the rules that all teams MUST run their tyres in compliance with the supplier's specifications so I'm thinking it's probably the latter situation.
This is an interesting read. Pirelli indicate that tyres are designed to fit on either the left or the right of the car, and are not designed to run on the 'wrong' side. They also stated that tyres pressures are under that indicated by Pirelli.
What I would like to know is (and its what you alluded to), did Pirelli express concerns to the teams/FIA about teams running tyres on the wrong side before Silverstone? We have known for a while some teams have been doing this for a while. When did Pirelli indicate that running tyres at lower pressures than indicated? If its some something that Pirelli are saying now, after Silverstone? Or was it something that have expressed in the past. I would assume that Pirelli would have to submit some sort of document to the teams/FIA regarding their tyres operating parameters.
The car to pit radio communications from last weekend, interesting what they were saying about the tyres but Also not seen an entire race communications down in print.
This is an interesting read. Pirelli indicate that tyres are designed to fit on either the left or the right of the car, and are not designed to run on the 'wrong' side. They also stated that tyres pressures are under that indicated by Pirelli.
See, that actually sounds like bullshit to me.
Maybe it's a little counter-intuitive but a lot of the forces on a tyre are the same regardless of whether it's on the left or the right.
The markings are still on the outside of the tyres so it's not like anybody's taking the tyres off the rims and fitting them the wrong way out.
That being the case, it really doesn't matter which side of the car the tyre is on. It's still the same part of the tyre that's exposed to the same loads.
Those loads are just being exerted in left-handers rather than right-handers and vice-versa.
It's true that any rotational forces will be applied in the "wrong" direction but the stuff Pirelli are talking about in that article doesn't actually relate to any rotational forces.
If they were blaming the delaminations on tyre-swapping, for example, I could probably buy that but I think all this talk about tyre swapping causing greater damage to the sidewalls is cobblers.
It certainly seems like it'd be reasonable to stop the teams swapping tyres but, having said that, if it's such a big deal how come Pirelli quietly allowed RBR to do it all year and said nothing as more teams jumped on the bandwagon and it's only now, after the debacle at Silverstone, that they've suddenly decided it's a causal factor?
Course, we should probably reserve some sympathy for Pirelli as well.
After the Bridgestone era the FIA have instructed Pirelli to make the tyres more and more fragile and now that philosophy is causing problems it seems like Pirelli are being left swinging in the wind.
Incidentally, I think I've said before but I've got some software from a 1990s F1 team which is supposed to be used to calculate pitstops and, while twiddling with the different variables, I was amazed to see how much you have to change things before you get a noticeable difference in lap time.
For example, if you have a nominal lap-time of 1:30, if you reduce engine horsepower by 20bhp it makes very little difference. Same thing when you reduce it by 50bhp. In fact, if you want to make the (theoretical) cars lap 1s slower you have to reduce engine power by over 100bhp.
Similar thing applies to tyre grip.
The software measures mechanical grip in a bunch of ways but, basically, you have to make all the values twice as "bad" before you add 1s to lap times.
The software is certainly out of date now and it probably uses a lot of obsolete calculations too but it gives us a vague idea of just how crappy Pirelli are deliberately making these tyres.
From a given starting point they're forced to make a tyre that's 50% "worse" in order to make the cars go 1s a lap slower.
With that sort of thing going on, it's hardly surprising that you end up making a poor quality product if you're continually required to make the tyres 1s slower and less durable year after year.
Frankly, I'm surprised they're not forced to make F1 tyres out of old flip-flops by now, in order the get the sort of performance that the FIA has asked for.
What happened on Sunday show's how stupid FIA no in season testing rule is.
Cars and tyres are built and designed by engineers, any engineer will tell that you test things before you use them and that as you develop something you re-test and that testing needs to be done in representative conditions, i.e. 2013 cars.
FIA and Bernie should stop meddling and let the engineers and drivers get on with their jobs without interference from FIA and Bernie who in reality know very little about F1 engineering or driving!
Comments
Bear in mind, as well, that it's a shorter track than Silverstone (IIRC) so they'll be doing more laps and, as a result, actually going over those kerbs more often than they were at Silverstone.
Be interesting if there are any shennanigans at the YDT by the teams who aren't keen on changing the tyres.
One thing that surprised me about the Silverstone race, was that drivers were told to stay of the kerbs, as it maybe what was causing the problem. Yet not many did, then they complained about how dangerous it was. Well if you listened to your team then it wouldnt have been as dangerous. I know drivers are programmed to take a certain line, and its hard to change. Yet they all manage to do it (avoid the white lines) when it rains.
I would assume the teams will tell the drivers, avoid the kerbs at the high speed corners in Germany as well. We will see if they listen, this time.
This being F1, you can bet there will be shenanigans, by most of the teams, not just the ones that dont want changes. I think they must realise, that the tyres will be changed after Germany. There is nothing they can do to stop that.
On a side note. Kimi wasnt happy with the teams call about the final pit stop. If the change in tyres, means Lotus end up slipping further down the grid, I can see him leaving. Especially when a team like RB want you.
That's pretty disappointing and kind of hands the title to Vettel for me... shame.
Yeah, some people will be quick to jump on the Pirrelli bandwagon but really, the FAI are the ones that decide what tyre they want to use and obviously they wanted something to make the action more 'exciting', as has been said they could easily make a tyre that requires not a single pitstop, really, the sky is their limit.
Blame the stupid FIA and their stupid rules for this farce.
Actually what 'Sky' said on the subject was that Pirrelli recommend a pressure setting for each race (at Silverstone it was 16-17 PSI) but that it's up to the individual teams' tyre technicians to decide what pressure to use and that typically they would under-inflate the tyres to increase the contact patch and increase traction. I don't think there are any regulations covering tyre pressures so we really have no idea how low some teams may have been running the tyres and if that may have been a factor. I wonder if the teams would even volunteer that information to Pirrelli?
See also the BBC link I posted yesterday, which broke this story then.
Thanks for pointing that out.
I remember reading your post, and thinking I will come back to the link...never did. Its not easy juggling work, and reading DS at the same time.
S'funny, I was looking at that too.
At one point, after the shit hit the fan, Hamilton was following di Resta and you could see that Hamilton was staying off the kerbs while di Resta wasn't and, at Copse, di Resta just romped off into the distance and left Hamilton for dead.
The TV director went back to that fight a few times and, 5 minutes later, you could see Hamilton running wider and wider until he was, once again, taking the same lines as di Resta, at which point he passed him.
It's kinda like I said before, about FIFA making it an offence to burst a football by kicking it too hard.
You'll never get players to deliberately kick the ball so softly that it definitely won't burst because it's likely that'll put them at a disadvantage to a player who's willing to kick the ball harder.
Instead, they'll all just kick the ball as hard as possible and hope it doesn't burst.
And, obviously, in both cases the fundamental reality is that sportsmen shouldn't be required to use equipment that might not be capable of withstanding use within their sport.
Funnily enough Pirrelli have now released a statement blaming the teams of exactly what I said plus running the tyres at extreme cambers and also running the rears on the wrong sides. Apparently every single tyre that failed in the race at Silverstone was being run on the wrong side. Pirrelli are squarely laying the fault for Sunday at the teams' door. They are saying they need more control over how the tyres are used once in the teams' possession i.e. that the recommendations they make about use are actually followed. Should make relations with the teams nice and happy going forward!!!
I understand why drivers didnt listen to the teams, and carried on driving over the kerbs. However then they shouldnt complain about how dangerous it was. The drivers made it more dangerous, by going over the kerbs. so why complain - you made it more dangerous?
If that is the case, why is Pirelli changing the construction on the tyres for Germany, and for future races reverting back to the 2012 tyres? Just get the FIA to force teams to stop swapping tyres and get them to run at a minimum PSI. Any team that does not confirm to these changes will be disqualified. Or are Pirelli trying to safe face, and shift the blame to the teams. I would guess its a bit of both.
I think the best way forward, is for Pirelli to use kevlar rather than steel in the constructions. The teams to stop swapping tyres, and to use a minimum PSI for their tyres set by Pirelli. This has to be better than reverting back to 2012 tyres.
TBH, I doubt that many drivers would complain about how dangerous it was, per-se.
What they're complaining about is the fact that they're pretty-much forced to do something potentially dangerous in order to be competitive, especially when it would, apparently, be possible to alleviate that risk by revising the tyres.
let's face it, F1 already bans drivers from putting all 4 wheels off the track but they all do that, not to cut corners but simply by running wide on the exits of corners, so they can carry more speed through a corner.
Would you really want F1 to become so safety-conscious that every instance where a driver leaves the track was penalised?
Cos, if you're going to tell drivers that they can't put any wheels on a kerb for safety reasons you're going to have to make that a rule too AND you're going to have to enforce it so harshly that no driver would risk the penalty for doing it.
Seems like it'd be far simpler to just give them tyres strong enough to deal with a bit of abuse from kerbs, just like suppliers have managed to do for the last 50-odd years.
The change to tyre construction is to resolve the delamination issue, not the puncture issues from last weekend. Pirrelli are saying that the way the teams use the tyres in conjunction with the unusually high speed left handers at Silvertone and the sharp back-edge of the kerbs on those corners was responsible for the failures on Sunday. They are suggesting that if the teams used the correct pressures, camber and used the correct tyre on the correct side there wouldn't have been any punctures.
That just leaves us with the delamination problem... so as you say, the question is why are Pirrelli having to react to an un-connected issue with a new tyre construction which will resolve the delamination issue which they thought they had already solved? Presumably because they wanted to re-introduce the kevlar belt all along but had been blocked by the three teams so used this half-measure of changing the adhesive. Now they see an opportunity to force through the kevlar change and at the same time save face by blaming the teams for last weekend hoping that the general public don't see the difference between the two situations.
It's all a bit of a mess.
I mean, if Pirelli design a tyre and say to the teams "Here's the tyres and they're designed to work at 19 psi with up to 5° of camber" and the teams go away and decide to use them at 16psi with up to 8° of camber then Pirelli have a point.
However if Pirelli say "The tyres are designed to work at between 15psi and 20psi and with anything up to 10° of camber" and the teams find that they work best at 16psi and with 8° of camber and then Pirelli say "Oh, wait, they're a bit fragile at the limits so you need to run higher pressure and less camber" then a team could, quite reasonably, say "Hang on, we built a f**king car to suit the info' you gave us and now you're telling us we have to compromise our car because your tyres can't work as you originally said they would" then really Pirelli needs to provide the tyre that they originally promised.
Must say, the thing regarding swapping tyres across the car seems like a no-brainer. That should simply be banned.
Of course, it wouldn't hurt Pirelli to ask themselves how they've ended up with a tyre that works better on the "wrong" side of the car either.
Your argument is one side of the coin. I can see also see the other side, which is (the Lotus/Force India) stance. They will say we have developed a car, that doesnt cause heavy wear on the tyres. To achieve this we have had to compromise on speed. The tyres are perfectly safe - we dont have a problem with them. Other teams have designed their cars that cause heavy wear on their tyres, but they have gained an advantage in being able to run faster. It seems there way was wrong - tough on them.
I think whats happened is that most of the teams have got it wrong and not thought too much about what the new tyres would have meant - they pushed the envelope and are now paying the price for pushing it too far.
The dilemma the FIA (did) have, is that they can say to the teams, most of you messed up with the design of your car. So we will give you a pass, and change the tyres. Which sticks two fingers up at the likes of Lotus/FI and says although you were clever enough to cope with the tyres, tough. Or would they say to the others teams, tough you messed up with the design. You will have to make an extra pit stop and/or drive a bit slower to make it to the end of the race. It seems the FIA have sides with the big teams and said we will give you a pass.
Lets face it these tyres are safe, if the teams made their away around the track at no more than 100mph, there would be no problems. However this will ruin the spectacle for the fans, and no doubt cost the FIA lost revenue. The teams want to be competitive so will continue to ignore the recommendations by Pirelli and push, just so they can be competitive. If a tyres delaminates, they can cry about safety etc.
From a personal point of view, I would rather the FIA say, we are not changing the tyres, you can run the tyres however you want. However the first time you have a delamination, you then have to run the tyres as recommended by Pirelli i.e. higher PSI and no swapping. That way the teams like Lotus/FI wont be penalised for coming up with a design that works. Teams would then actually force their drivers from running over the kerbs, and will make the additional pitstop if required. However I appreciate this wont be as exciting for the fans. Then again neither was seeing Brawn run with the double diffuser and see Button runaway with the title. Penalising a team for solving a problem (in this case the tyres) is wrong in my book.
Do you really think that Lotus and ForceIndia wouldn't have made their cars faster if they could?
FI, in particular, has made a career out of building plodding cars and creeping into the bottom end of the points by doing as few pitstops as possible.
It's like entering a diesel Astra in a sportscar race when everybody else has Porsches and Ferraris and then, when it turns out that the tyres burst at over 100mph, the Astra team saying they're quite happy with the tyres while the Porsche and Ferrari drivers whine about how crappy the tyres are.
Sure, you can take that route if you want but then it really does become "Formula Tyresave" rather than a competition between teams seeking to build the best racing car possible and drivers seeking to drive them as fast as possible.
Of course Lotus and FI would have made their cars faster of they could. But they would then have (probably) had higher tyre ware. So they found a compromise between tyre wear and speed. I tend to agree with you about FI, it seems as they have just lucked into the situation, due to lack of budget/resources to push the envelope. But Lotus on the other hand, I think the made a concious decision to go the route they have.
I agree with you it does become "formula tyresave", and its not what the fans want to see. But is it any worse than "Formula Double Diffuser" (2009) or the "Formula Adrian Newey" (that 2011 was), or "Formula Schumacher/Brawn/Todt/Bryne" (early to mid 2000s)? There will always be a "Formula xxx", with the exception of possibly last year. Although Newey brilliance did come the fore towards the end of the season.
Yeah but there's a difference between a situation where a couple of teams are just flat-out better than all the rest and the current situation where most of the current teams are better than the tyres they're using.
Again, my opinion really depends on how the tyres were originally specified.
IF the teams are deliberately running the tyres out of spec' then, sure. It's their own fault and they need to change their cars.
If, OTOH, they're just running tyres near the limits of the original spec' and now Pirelli are saying that's not safe then Pirelli have an obligation to make better tyres.
Unless I'm mistaken, after Spa last year - where RBR were found to be running tyres out of spec' and had massive tyre wear, it was written into the rules that all teams MUST run their tyres in compliance with the supplier's specifications so I'm thinking it's probably the latter situation.
The problem with the tyre situation, is that everyone is blaming everyone else. So you dont get the true picture. As Si alluded to, Pirelli should publish under what conditions they said there tyres would work under. Then we can start to get a picture of where the problem lies. Although since Pirelli are changing the materials and process used to make future tyres, you have to think that the problem lies with them rather than what the teams are doing.
I think all fans, regardless of who you support will agree its a mess.
This is an interesting read. Pirelli indicate that tyres are designed to fit on either the left or the right of the car, and are not designed to run on the 'wrong' side. They also stated that tyres pressures are under that indicated by Pirelli.
What I would like to know is (and its what you alluded to), did Pirelli express concerns to the teams/FIA about teams running tyres on the wrong side before Silverstone? We have known for a while some teams have been doing this for a while. When did Pirelli indicate that running tyres at lower pressures than indicated? If its some something that Pirelli are saying now, after Silverstone? Or was it something that have expressed in the past. I would assume that Pirelli would have to submit some sort of document to the teams/FIA regarding their tyres operating parameters.
http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2013/07/03/2013-british-grand-prix-team-radio-transcript/
See, that actually sounds like bullshit to me.
Maybe it's a little counter-intuitive but a lot of the forces on a tyre are the same regardless of whether it's on the left or the right.
The markings are still on the outside of the tyres so it's not like anybody's taking the tyres off the rims and fitting them the wrong way out.
That being the case, it really doesn't matter which side of the car the tyre is on. It's still the same part of the tyre that's exposed to the same loads.
Those loads are just being exerted in left-handers rather than right-handers and vice-versa.
It's true that any rotational forces will be applied in the "wrong" direction but the stuff Pirelli are talking about in that article doesn't actually relate to any rotational forces.
If they were blaming the delaminations on tyre-swapping, for example, I could probably buy that but I think all this talk about tyre swapping causing greater damage to the sidewalls is cobblers.
It certainly seems like it'd be reasonable to stop the teams swapping tyres but, having said that, if it's such a big deal how come Pirelli quietly allowed RBR to do it all year and said nothing as more teams jumped on the bandwagon and it's only now, after the debacle at Silverstone, that they've suddenly decided it's a causal factor?
Course, we should probably reserve some sympathy for Pirelli as well.
After the Bridgestone era the FIA have instructed Pirelli to make the tyres more and more fragile and now that philosophy is causing problems it seems like Pirelli are being left swinging in the wind.
Incidentally, I think I've said before but I've got some software from a 1990s F1 team which is supposed to be used to calculate pitstops and, while twiddling with the different variables, I was amazed to see how much you have to change things before you get a noticeable difference in lap time.
For example, if you have a nominal lap-time of 1:30, if you reduce engine horsepower by 20bhp it makes very little difference. Same thing when you reduce it by 50bhp. In fact, if you want to make the (theoretical) cars lap 1s slower you have to reduce engine power by over 100bhp.
Similar thing applies to tyre grip.
The software measures mechanical grip in a bunch of ways but, basically, you have to make all the values twice as "bad" before you add 1s to lap times.
The software is certainly out of date now and it probably uses a lot of obsolete calculations too but it gives us a vague idea of just how crappy Pirelli are deliberately making these tyres.
From a given starting point they're forced to make a tyre that's 50% "worse" in order to make the cars go 1s a lap slower.
With that sort of thing going on, it's hardly surprising that you end up making a poor quality product if you're continually required to make the tyres 1s slower and less durable year after year.
Frankly, I'm surprised they're not forced to make F1 tyres out of old flip-flops by now, in order the get the sort of performance that the FIA has asked for.
Cars and tyres are built and designed by engineers, any engineer will tell that you test things before you use them and that as you develop something you re-test and that testing needs to be done in representative conditions, i.e. 2013 cars.
FIA and Bernie should stop meddling and let the engineers and drivers get on with their jobs without interference from FIA and Bernie who in reality know very little about F1 engineering or driving!