The vibration issue that compromised Aston Martin's pre-season testing could cause nerve damage to drivers warns Adrian Newey.

Consequently, Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll will probably have limited time in the car over the Melbourne weekend.

"The vibration into the chassis is causing a few reliability problems," admitted Newey, "mirrors falling off, tail lights falling off, all that sort of thing, which we are having to address.

"But the much more significant problem with that is that that vibration is transmitted ultimately into the driver's fingers," he added. "Fernando is of the feeling that he cannot do more than 25 laps consecutively before he will risk permanent nerve damage to his hands. Lance is of the opinion that he cannot do more than 15 laps before that threshold."

Though he didn't comment, it is thought that the Canadian's inability to last as many laps as his teammate is due to the effects of the wrist injury suffered in early 2023, and which has flared up a couple of times since.

"On our expectations, it is something that unfortunately Koji and I haven't had a chance to discuss properly," said Newey, referring to Honda Racing president Koji Watanabe, who was sitting alongside. "But we are going to have to be very heavily restricted on how many laps we do in the race until we get on top of the source of the vibration and improve the vibration at source."

"It's not painful, not difficult to control the car," said Alonso. "The adrenaline is way higher than the pain. If we were fighting for the win we could do three hours in the car. I think that overcomes anything when you are on the car.

"But definitely it is something that is unusual," he admitted. "It shouldn't be there and we don't know the consequences either, if you keep driving like that for months, so a solution has to be implemented and as I said everyone is trying every day in Japan to fix the things, so we are here to help as well.

"The vibrations coming from the engine are hurting the components in the car and the drivers, we feel them," the Spaniard explained. "We feel our body with this frequency of the vibration that you feel after 20 or 25 minutes. A little bit numb, on your hands or your feet or whatever. Since Bahrain, there were a couple of tests done and some of the solutions are implemented on the car now.

Asked if retiring from the race would be his call, the two-time world champion replied: "We will see. In a way, deep inside, I have the feeling that problems will be fixed every time I jump in the car, I close the visor and I really hope that everything will be better.

"After the last few weeks in Japan I think for us it is important to test the car tomorrow, on Friday and then maybe decide Friday night, Saturday night, let's see how things go and as I said I have a feeling on me that it could be all fine and we can do a normal weekend, but let's see."

"I guess just like, electrocute yourself in a chair or something like that, it's not far off," added teammate Stroll when asked to describe how it felt in the car. It's a very uncomfortable vibration. It's bad for the engine but it's also bad for the human inside the car. We need to just get on top of it, but I think we will.

"It's life, you know," he added, "sometimes you're a driver and some seasons you get in the car and it's magic, and some seasons you get in the car and it's shit! You just have to go with it and work with what you have.

"If we still have the same vibration issues we had with the car in Bahrain, it's going to be hard to do much more than 10-15 laps," he admitted. "If we resolved those issues the last couple of weeks, then I think we can go much further into the race. Time will tell.

"Right now times are tough," he continued, "but I believe the future is very bright. I have full belief in Adrian and he's done this once or twice before, so, I have full belief in us as a team, Honda included."

"The positive out of this is that our relationship has strengthened," insisted Newey, whose mood wasn't helped by a faulty microphone. "The relationship between Honda and AMR.

"We are working very much as a partnership now. That is good, clearly. I think we are able to help each other. I think the important thing to understand though is that the battery is the thing that we have been focussing on."

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1. Posted by Editor, 2 hours ago

"@ Schrodinger's cat

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2. Posted by Schrodinger's cat, 3 hours ago

"@Ed

"It's life, you know," she added, "sometimes you're a driver and some seasons you get in the car and it's magic, and some seasons you get in the car and it's shit! You just have to go with it and work with what you have.

Is Lance Stroll transgender?"

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Newey admits risk of nerve damage to Aston Martin drivers

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