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'Red Bull teams using trick to reduce tyre pressures'

Published on 13 May 2016 08:15
6
By: Rob Veenstra

Rumours some teams have found a loophole around Pirelli's minimum tyre pressure rules are doing the rounds in the Barcelona paddock. Auto Motor und Sport correspondent Michael Schmidt claims McLaren wrote a letter to the FIA seeking clarification about a supposed technical trick that lowers tyre pressures once a car is running.

Pirelli's mandatory minimum tyre pressures in 2016, much higher than in the past, have proved controversial and unpopular. But Pirelli and the FIA have reportedly noticed that two teams - one top team and another midfield runner - have shown in-race pressures that are consistently 2 PSI lower than their competitors.

Mercedes has denied it is the guilty party: "The measures to reduce pressure would, in our opinion, have too many bad side effects," the German report quoted the team as saying. And Force India's team manager Andy Stevenson said the kind of technology involved would be too expensive for the Silverstone team. Two more teams linked with the trick have been Red Bull and Toro Rosso.

McLaren reportedly suspects that the offending teams have come up with a double-walled rim in which pressure can be released while the car is running, but the FIA says that solution would be illegal. The issue, including a potential enforcement of minimum tyre pressures when the cars are actually running, was reportedly discussed briefly in the teams' briefing with Charlie Whiting on Wednesday. (GMM)

F1 News Mercedes Pirelli McLaren Force India

Replies (6)

mclarenfan1968

Posts: 1,027
I am not surprised, when merc has free reign now to go unchecked with their illegal car others are thinking WTF for should they be nice and follow the spirit of the rules?
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- May 13 2016 - 08:37
Supersport

Posts: 1
Mclarenfan 'Illegal mercs', please explain or is it just sour grapes? Btw i am also a long time Mclaren fan but have admiration for what merc have done in the past few years
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- May 13 2016 - 09:22
calle.itw

Posts: 8,527
Well, Red Bull does have a knack for using these kind of things, so hardly surprising if this is the case. But its just wishthinking that Mercedes would be using something like this aswell.
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- May 13 2016 - 13:02
RacetoWin

Posts: 95
This can easily done, stock cars use pressure relief valves to keep their tires from gaining pressure while out on track, these would be set to 20 psi in this case and it wouldn't allow the tires go past this set pressure and keeping tires from going over when they heat up.

i wouldn't be surprised in F1 if they had remote relief valves inside a TPMS sensor and control the psi from remote via pit wall, they can then allow it to build up temp and pressure on the in lap so they come off the car with a 20 psi pressure when they are checked.

its pretty smart and this should be allowed, as they wouldn't be able to drop too much pressure or they wouldn't be able to get the tires back up to 20 psi.
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- May 14 2016 - 04:00
- calle.itw
  
  Posts: 8,527
  If they allow that they might aswell revert to the tyre pressure they used last year, it was lower than what that device can achieve and would leave no room for such devices, and all team would be affected. The whole point with the higher pressure was so that the Pirelli tyres could last longer, reducing the pressure might lead to tyre explosions like those we had in e.g Spa last year.
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  May 14 2016 - 10:09
RacetoWin

Posts: 95
something like this.

www.pegasusautorac(...)on.asp?Product=3336
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- May 14 2016 - 04:02