Renault in race to fix battery problems
Renault Sport have confirmed that the reason why its teams have hardly run today is due to a common problem with the energy recovery system. The company have found a solution but will need to fly additional parts into the circuit to get all teams running again.
Together, the Renault powered teams completed just 38 laps so far at Jerez, compared to 138 by Ferrari and 248 for Mercedes. While yesterday's problems did not appear to have anything to do with the engines, Renault's Remi Taffin confirmed that the lack of today's running is due to problems identified by Renault.
“We have clearly identified a problem that we could not fix this morning, but we are working to ensure that the teams, especially Red Bull and Toro Rosso are able to take to the track at 9am. It's a sequential problem resulting from the integration of all systems".
Taffin further said the problem is to do with hardware only, and while spare parts are available at the track, they do not have enough of them to get all teams running again. Therefore, parts from Viry will be flown over to the circuit to resolve the issue for all three customer teams available at the Jerez test.
The issue is to do with the control system of the batteries, and different packaging within the different cars makes fixing it all the more difficult. He said "sometimes it's easy, but due to the design of cars, sometimes we first have to remove a lot of parts before being able to access the batteries".
