Pirelli Strategy 2011

[jon-]

Good morning all, I've been reading this site for a year or two now & only just got round to signing up and posting!

I was just wondering if anybody else had picked up on the pirelli tyre allocations for the first four races, where they are bringing the hard and soft tyres (i thought they were meant to be going aggressive!). If I remember correctly, didnt Bridgestone bring the super-soft & medium tyres to Bahrain the last two years & they were snooze-fests - from what I understand Bahrain is not a 'tyre killer' track.

Do you think we will really see 2-3 stops in Bahrain or just another boring 1stop race?

I'm new too

Last I heard their super softs aren't quite up to spec yet, so Pirelli have taken the safe option.

Looking at the drop off on the soft compound I'm not sure they'll manage to one stop.

[Jersey Tom]

Do you guys not recall the problems Michelin had when they came back?

They had amazing grip, then they fell off a cliff with a graining phase and then they settled down.

I suspect the same for the Pirellis.

We have ben spoilt by conservative tyres and where you were all moaning that you wanted tyre stops and degradation, now it seems ot be on the cards you have bottled it!

Let's see what goes on before we judge eh?

Pirelli's previous ventures in F1 weren't exactly amazing. But hey, I'll give them a fair shot.

[raymondu999]

How come the general consensus is that these tyres degrade FAST, but there isn't rubbering in that's happening on the circuit?

[Tim.Wright]

I have seen a few pictures of cars stopped on the track and it looks like there is rubber pissed everywhere.

It would be ironic if the degrading tyres give the drivers more opportunity to pass but no-one can actually make it possible on all of the marbles!

Tim

[raymondu999]

Yeah the marbles are abundant, but the track doesn't seem to rubber in.

[Jersey Tom]

Not exactly a new phenomenon...

Article here. Excerpt:

In the aftermath of last season's Allstate 400 at the Brickyard -- widely viewed as the second-most-prestigious race on the NASCAR schedule behind the Daytona 500 -- nobody took more heat than Goodyear when tires, rather than rubbering in the race track as had been the case in previous years, instead began disintegrating into a fine dust.

Picture from USA Today...


Tires lasted all of 10-ish laps, with almost powdery rubber bits all over the track. Was not a good Monday morning at the office.

I'm confident this amount (and type) of wear, plus the extreme give-up, is not intentional on Pirelli's part, nor is it a good thing. But hey, they're starting this program from scratch again and learning as they go I'm sure.

[raymondu999]

So you're saying it's borne out of a lack of research and development on their part?

[Jersey Tom]

Absolutely. Can't blame them to some degree, but this is exactly what I had been talking about when the news first came out that Pirelli was going to be taking the title of tire supplier.

Pirelli's last foray into F1 was what, 80s or early 90s in open competition with Goodyear? They were in and out fairly quickly, but since then I'm sure a lot of knowledge was lost, the tracks have evolved, and the cars are very different. They've had less than a year to do all the development of molds, constructions, and compound formulations.. and their test time has been pretty limited. It takes time and experience to get this stuff right.

Beyond that, Pirelli just isn't at the same scale as some of the other players. The major players, IMO, are Goodyear/Dunlop, Bridgestone/Firestone, and Michelin/BFG (plus the rest of all their subsidiaries). Pirelli is probably 1/4 the size of any of those, certainly in annual sales.

Going to take an absolutely immense amount of R&D activity for them to get to the point where Bridgestone would have been. BS/FS didn't think it was worth the money, but I hope it pays off for Pirelli in some manner.

As an aside, I believe Goodyear still has more F1 wins than any other tire manufacturer that's been in the sport.. despite not having raced since '98.

[dave kumar]

Tom, can you just clear up a few things for me.

Are we getting a different sort of marbles with the Pirelli than previously - the pictures I've seen in this thread show large chunks? It was mentioned earlier in the thread that the track isn't rubbering in, can we attribute this to the less oily compound that is rumoured to being used as reported by WB

Nobody seems to know the technical side of the changes. The Bridgestone tyres apparently used a lot more oily substances to make the tyres soft. They also supposedly used under curing to make a soft tyre which would finish vulcanization under race temperatures to "come back".

The Pirelli tyres in contrast are not leaving plastic debris on the track which fails to "rubber in" in the classical way. The debris seems to be dry and gets swept away by moderate forces like wind and aerodynamic turbulences behind cars...

Is there any chance that it was planned to use a less oily compound (I think you know I have no clue about tyres, but hey), and have dry marbles that don't have as much effect on traction off the racing line?

Probably wrong, but I'm just praying that this doesn't spell disaster for overtaking, especially if we take into account the fragility of the compound.

[Jersey Tom]

That question is starting to get into specifics of compounding which I can't disclose

[ubrben]

I'm willing to give Pirelli the benefit of the doubt - it's a big challenge and I definitely respect them for taking it on.

But lets be clear - the level of degradation is not "planned" in the way Paul Hembrey would like us to believe. A good example of Pirelli's level was Spa LMS last year. Racing Box (MIK) ran two lola LMPs, one with gents on Dunlop and the other with quick pro drivers on Pirelli. The gents were faster in the wet and only .5 sec slower in Q vs. 2sec slower that they'd be with the same package.

I'm very interested to see what the racing's like.

Ben

[WhiteBlue]

That question is starting to get into specifics of compounding which I can't disclose

Come on, we are talking Pirelli technology! You have been telling us about the use of plasticisers in earlier threads. So there must be some general knowledge that can be shared by those who are informed about the basics. I understand you are working for a competitor of Pirelli and Bridgestone. How is it confidential to make remark about insights into different compound approaches by competitors? I don't want to attack you personally but I don't understand the issue and it is frustrating that our tyre experts suddenly go mum.

[Jersey Tom]

Some things are public domain information... for example that a tire rubber broadly consists of varying amounts and types of polymer, filler, cure agents, and process oils. The specifics of who uses what, in what quantity, and some of the cause and effect is NOT common public info. This is one of those cause and effect bits and given that I'm still under confidentiality, I'd rather be safe and avoid it.

I certainly agree with Ben that they deserve a fair shot, but this stuff takes time to get right... and Pirellli hasn't had much R&D time yet.

[dave kumar]

Tom,

You know best what you can and cannot disclose, I didn't realise it was so close to proprietary knowledge, so apologies.

Here's hoping that Pirelli are able to give the drivers tyres they can be agressive or smooth on and reward both types of driving with an extra few tenths or an extra few laps respectively. Tough job to satisfy everybody.

May be the overtaking working group should look at 'good' and 'bad' marbles, if there is such a thing.

[WhiteBlue]

It appear to me that the Pirelli approach of a drier and more brittle tyre makes sense in the current circumstances. You have to consider that the ongoing Bridgestone development in 2006 was based on technology acquired in a tyre war. They had no reason to cancel that approach and do something totally new. So they stayed with their performance oriented compounds that used more oils and a different chemistry for the cross linking.

Pirelli can be fairly sure that they will not have competition any time soon. The political scenario is firmly anti tyre war. IMO they are doing themselves a favor by going for compounds with dry debris. The differential grip between the racing line and off line should be smaller in the end which should be good for racing.