Ferrari are believed to have overcome some of the problems they were experiencing with their KERS technology following a productive test in Mugello this week.
The Italian team revealed last year that they were behind schedule with their KERS programme and team president Luca di Montezemolo brandished the system as a costly mistake.
It was also speculated that the Maranello-based outfit may start the season without KERS, putting them at a distinct disadvantage to rivals McLaren and BMW Sauber who are understood to be further down the road with their package.
However, a successful test for Ferrari’s new F60 in Mugello in Italy this week – albeit against the backdrop of heavy rain which the team had hoped to avoid – has given the team renewed hope that they will begin the season with a working KERS system.
In fact, Ferrari’s chief engineer Chris Dyer reckons that the biggest area for development is with the F60’s use of slick tyres.
“At the moment it’s difficult to say how it will be,” Dyer told Gazzetta dello Sport. “As you know, the main new things are essentially three things: aerodynamics, KERS, and slick tyres.”
“Regarding the first two everything is going in the best possible way, but unfortunately the latter we haven’t been able to verify yet. Surely we can’t wait to fit the slick tyres on, because only with them we’ll know how quick we can be.”
With regard to KERS Dyer revealed that a full working device had been used by Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen, albeit predominantly for testing safety.
“I’m not saying every lap, as the drivers maybe want, but we make use of it fairly often to study its safety. It’s an interesting thing, a challenge from a technical point of view.”
Speaking specifically about the three day shake-down for the new F60 in Mugello this week Dyer added: “In this third day we’ve just done more than 500 kilometres and everything went positively. There really has been nothing to worry about.”
