Quote:
Originally Posted by javadog
Yeah, really. You might need to learn a little bit more about the sport. It ain't as simple as you think. The curbs weren't an issue last year, but they were this year. What changed? The tire carcass construction. Not an issue for last years tires, but it was for these. And it wasn't every curb on the track; a couple of them have been identified as problematic.
Note that in the race, the team engineers were increasing the tire pressures, to move the contact patch away from the inside edge (a function of the camber they run) and more towards the center. They also instructed the drivers to stay off of the curbs in certain corners.
The info is out there, if you want to look it up. Damage from curbs is not a new issue, nor is it restricted to cars. The FIA has curb designs standards for races they sanction, the FIM has different standards for motorcycle races and they conflict in various ways with those of the FIA. It makes it tough for tracks that want to hold both top-level car and bike racing.
JR
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Don't patronize me. I have the info. I'll quote:
Race director Charlie Whiting has admitted he nearly red-flagged the race while the FIA has asked the Italian manufacturer to attend their Sporting Working Committee at Silverstone on Wednesday to do some explaining.
and
FIA race director Charlie Whiting admits he nearly brought the British GP to a halt after four drivers saw one of their rear tyres explode.
Lewis Hamilton, Felipe Massa, Jean-Eric Vergne and Sergio Perez all had their races stymied by left-rear tyre failures, with the quartet lucky to remain some semblance of control of their cars during the incidents.
With tyres puncturing with such regularity, concern for the safety of the drivers grew, and Whiting reveals that when Perez's tyre blew on lap 46, he considered red flagging the race.
"It was quite close to being red flagged. It did occur to me to do that," said Whiting.
"I don't want to put figures on it, but it was close," he added of how many punctures would have ended the race.
"I don't think we've seen anything like this (in F1 history). I can't remember anything. To have four total catastrophic failures, I believe, is a first."
and from Pirelli
Pirelli's motorsport director Paul Hembery said: "There have obviously been some issues with rear-left tyre failures which we have not seen before. We are taking the situation very seriously and we are currently investigating all tyres to determine the cause as soon as possible, ahead of the next Grand Prix in Germany. At the moment, we can't really say much more until we have fully investigated and analysed all of these incidents, which is our top priority.
and your own statement:
The curbs weren't an issue last year, but they were this year. What changed? The tire carcass construction. Not an issue for last years tires, but it was for these.
Pirelli most certainly DO and ARE being forced to explain this issue to the FIA.
Formula one has never had this number of similar catastrophic blowouts in one race. Not only that, it was always the same tire - left rear. The teams and drivers have all said, and history has shown, that the Silverstone curbs have not caused this sort of issue before, at least not to this extent.
So what is the basic culprit? This year's tire construction. The tire's construction
this year has created a vulnerability to being cut on the inside during curb jumping, a problem that has rarely occurred in the past, other than at some notable tracks with curbs specifically designed to discourage their use. This is not a normal vulnerability for an F1 tire, and is why every team up and down the pit lane, the FIA, and race director Charlie Whiting himself became alarmed to the extent that Charlie nearly stopped the race.
The bandaid measures of adding two pounds of pressure (highly irregular in F1, where pressure increments are made in fractions of a pound) and asking drivers to avoid curbs that have never caused a problem before were simply measures to try to avoid more blowouts.
Therefore, the FIA has called Pirelli in for some explaining on Wednesday.