Ferrari critical of KERS plans

Ferrari`s vice president Piero Ferrari believes the Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems will only increase costs and will not improve the racing.

KERS are due to be introduced in Formula One from 2009 in what promises to be a major challenge for engineers.

The system will allow drivers to draw 60kW of energy from one axle on the car to be used in the form of a “push-to-pass” button to increase the chances of overtaking.

Ferrari, however, believes the system will not mean more overtaking and will also see the teams having to spend more money in research.

“We should reflect on many of the technical and sporting decisions taken in F1 lately,” he told Italian magazine Autosprint.

“Engines were frozen with the result that all of them now run at 19,000 revolutions, so there`s no difference in power nor revs, and therefore there`s no way you can take advantage of a possible overrevving to try to overtake.

“We should have done something similar to what NASCAR has done: to set some limits in the regulations, while allowing for researching and re-designing. The way the regulations are right now, we can`t re-design a single part to improve it. It`s excessive. Ferrari have great engine guys twiddling their thumbs.

“By contrast, they make us spend time and money to design the KERS, for which we can`t evaluate the costs precisely because it`s a new technology.

“It`s also based on knowledge unknown to traditional engine guys, like high-capacity batteries and high-performance electrical engines, for which you need specialized engineers from outside the motoring world.

“To acquire that know-how will cause high levels of spending over the years, it`s not the best solution to reduce costs.

“Engine recovery is fine, but not this way. Too many different systems to recover energy have been permitted. They need to be limited, otherwise costs could go sky-high, with the risk of having to cut drastically on other areas to limit spending, as was done with engines, revs, and electronics.

“This way we risk to transform an F1 car into a GP2 car, and that must not happen.”

23.4.2008   ▪ Formula One    ▪ Ferrari    ▪ www.autosport.com