Bigpower

Whilst doing a test session at Bahrain with Pirelli Nico Rosberg suffered a tyre explosion at 300kph. He was not injured but Mercedes still pull out of the test. Good old Pirelli...how long have they been making tyres for:banghead:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/25449812

pablo wrote:Whilst doing a test session at Bahrain with Pirelli Nico Rosberg suffered a tyre explosion at 300kph. He was not injured but Mercedes still pull out of the test. Good old Pirelli...how long have they been making tyres for:banghead:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/25449812

I know they have to so dome testing on track but it really does seem they do ALL of it on the track, too many tyre blowouts for this day and age. Thank god we have very good safety equipment now otherwise there would be no drivers left!

It's the private test for the 2014 tyres with several teams taking part.

Pirelli are testing various specs and constructions, and apparently this was one that hadn't even been tested in the factory. There's no info yet as to if there was any reason for the failure (puncture/debris?) so it's just speculation for now, but it's not ideal.

It seems to me that Pirelli need to be investing in their own test car and need to hire their own test driver to put their kit through its paces before putting the risk solely in the laps of the various teams drivers

I can't imagine the legal shit storm to befall Pirelli if this incident had resulted in the death of one of the teams drivers......had this been a Red Bull that was being driven by Vettel and had the subsequent tyre failure resulted in the German knocking on the pearly gates I'm sure the damages pertaining to loss of future World Championships and associated costs etc. would go on for years

Pirelli do have their own car- an old Renault (2009?), but it can't generate the loadings a modern car can, hence the requested open test by various teams using the 2013 cars.

Problem is, the 2014 powertrains are going to be a further step ahead.

Danny@APT wrote:Pirelli do have their own car- an old Renault (2009?), but it can't generate the loadings a modern car can, hence the requested open test by various teams using the 2013 cars.

Problem is, the 2014 powertrains are going to be a further step ahead.

That's interesting to know, I'm intrigued to see how the tyre testing data obtained whilst using the 2013 V8 cars is translated by the Pirelli boffins to be relevant for the new 2014 V6 cars

Well, apparently the lap times were slower, which suggests the new tyres are harder/more conservative than the 2013 ones- other than that we've got to wait til Jan/Feb for the first tests.