MotoGP News
Date: 28/July/2011
The present situation at the beleaguered Ducati MotoGP team cannot continue.
Ten rounds into the 2011 season, new signing and home Italian hero Valentino Rossi has taken just one podium finish - a fortuitous third, after two riders clashed ahead of him, at Le Mans in May.
For Rossi, winner of a record 79 premier-class races - and seven world titles - it's his longest losing streak since joining MotoGP in 2000.
And with a radically redesigned version of the 2011 Desmosedici (the GP11.1) looking like a false dawn, Ducati - perhaps with a gentle nudge from Rossi and his mechanics - are rumoured to be considering dumping its unique carbon-fibre chassis and jumping on the aluminium twin-spar bandwagon.
Ducati used its traditional steel trellis frame when it entered MotoGP in 2003, but quickly become ever more technically adventurous.
The Bologna-based manufacturer moved nearer to F1 design principles by making the engine part of the frame, rather than simply carried within it, then swapped metal for carbon fibre at the front and rear sections by 2009.
While his team-mates struggled, Casey Stoner took the 'stressed member' engine concept to stunning title success in 2007. But the following introduction of carbon fibre seemed to stump even the Australian, who labelled a lack of front-end feel as the cause of his accidents.
Stoner still won races using the carbon fibre chassis - seven during the 2009 and 2010 seasons, before moving to Honda - but Rossi, whose previous premier-class career had been spent exclusively on Japanese bikes, looks totally stumped.
Rossi's previous Hondas and Yamahas all used twin-spar aluminium frames, a conservative design that has been perfected by the Japanese over 20 years. Yamaha's recently retired technical guru, Masao Furusawa, explained why he continued to turn down carbon fibre.
"Carbon fibre is very good for keeping rigidity and it is very lightweight. But for a motorcycle I don’t think it is so good," he said.
"When you lean a motorcycle at over 45 degrees there is almost no suspension, so you need some flexibility in the frame. You also need smooth stiffness changes along the length of the frame to avoid chatter.
"But with carbon fibre it is really hard to control stiffness. It is a case of the stiffer the better with carbon fibre, which is why it is perfect for a Formula One chassis."
So why did Ducati leap a whole generation of MotoGP frame development, moving from steel to stressed-member carbon fibre without pausing to use the proven twin-spar aluminium concept?
The answer is that, without taking such gambles, it is difficult for Ducati to succeed in MotoGP.
The relatively small Italian company knows it will be outgunned in a head-to-head arms race with the massive Japanese brands, so they take big risks to beat them.
Livio Suppo, head of the Factory Ducati team from its 2003 MotoGP debut until the end of 2009 - when he switched to Honda - explains:
“With the limited resources of Ducati you need something special to dominate. You need to be very smart or lucky.
"The 2007 championship is a perfect example: Choosing Casey and the 'crazy' idea to move from Michelin to Bridgestone tyres. Without those two things it would probably have been impossible to win.
"The bigger the company the more possibilities you have to get it right. Because of that Honda usually has the highest and longest positive cycles in MotoGP. Yamaha is a little below and Ducati is more up and down.”
Ironically, one of the biggest motivators behind Ducati's risk-taking design strategy was that they always felt it would be impossible to beat Rossi on similar equipment.
But now they have finally achieved their dream of signing the Italian megastar, Ducati is facing the prospect of deconstructing its radical approach in order for Rossi to unleash his talent.
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