Toro Rosso technical director James Key admits his team is still searching to discover what caused Brendon Hartley’s incredible suspension failure during Saturday practice at the British GP.
The Kiwi was approaching Brooklands when the front-left imploded the moment he touched the brakes, sending his car into the gravel and barrier at relatively high-speed and despite frantically trying to rebuild his car in time for the race start, Hartley would only last a lap before returning to the pits to retire.
Speaking to Motorsport.com, one possibility that Key had ruled out was an upgraded suspension part was to blame after reverting to an old-spec as a precaution.
“It is still being investigated and understood. We’ve never had any issues at all, certainly not of that nature. We did nine races without any problems,” said the British engineer.
“We haven’t seen anything like that, all the loads that were going through the front left suspension were well within the loads that it was designed for.
“That corner had a history, it had been used the previous day, it had been used in Canada, a big braking track, it had been used in Bahrain.
“It had been serviced and quality control checked, proof-tested, and everything was fine,” he added.
“What we need to establish whether there was some damage to it.”
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Key would then explain the process currently being undertaken with the junior Red Bull team hoping not for a repeat in the future.
“They’ve been sent back to the factory, they’ve all been quarantined, they will go through a forensic examination so that we can work out what is impact damage, what is the potential failure, clues to how a failure could have occurred, etc. And we have various options to address any possible outcomes,” he said.
“We did a race with Pierre for 52 laps without any problems whatsoever, so it feels like a one-off, due to a set of circumstances that we need to understand, although you can never make assumptions like that.”
