A meeting between teams at this weekends Grand Prix was held at the Toyota Hospitality center and KERS became a topic of discussion. Many teams are working on their KERS system for next year although it is not mandated by the FIA that they have to have it operational by 2009. BMW and Red Bull have experienced ‘incidents’ with their systems that has caused and fire (Red Bull) and personal injury (BMW).
These incidents have created some controversy that the teams may be pressing too hard to have a mature KERS system operational and one can only imagine that the smaller teams are struggling to develop one at all. Force India has secured rights to use Ferrari’s system when the get it ready for use.
The teams were looking for a gentlemen’s agreement to halt the deployment of the KERS system for 2009 in favor of waiting a year and developing the system in a more controlled and systematic manner with time being the needed factor for success. The vote failed with only 6 out of the 7 needed to halt the deployment. Hello KERS 2009.
For what it is worth, I think the system is a great idea but I also wonder if they aren’t rushing it. I am also unclear on exactly how the energy will be used and am not sold on a push-to-pass button. I think teams like Honda and BMW as well as Toyota could be the beneficiaries of such technology for their road car divisions so for that reason I would like to see it next year but if pragmatism is ruling the day here, better we take a longer look at just how we are going to control the energy instead of sending it to ground through a mechanic.
