Non Compliant Race Suits

[pvda]

There's a thread on the Ten-tenths forum discussing what is being nicknamed Suitgate during the Abu Dhabi V8 round.

All of a sudden a lot of the drivers and team members changed from their nice new fire resistant team race suits to all sort of other borrowed units.

Reading through the thread it looks like someone has been borrowing another companies FIA compliance number.

So in this day and age of internet overseas purchasing of goods it's a timely reminder to make sure that Silk Purse you are buying on line doesn't turn out to be a Sow's Ear, especially when it comes to safety equipment

[imortl]

I read something similar (I thought it was here).

I thought that the big sting with it was that the suits were bought from an Australian distributor? Anyone else hear something? I could have this all crossed up here.

Apparently some drivers had to borrow spare suits from other drivers. Going to be interesting to see the fallout. Not just from a (possible) litigation point but ti see if this will cause a further issue with apparel and us.....

[Marcus]

SUITGATE????

Oh FFS, enough with the gates.

/end personal aggrivation

[Dave Kelly]

Originally Posted by Marcus

SUITGATE????

Oh FFS, enough with the gates. ...

+ 1 .. agree with you entirely Marcus

... and so what anyway Paul? They discovered there were some suits that you say were technically non-compliant.. so they borrowed / arranged for others which were OK.

Problem solved!

Life moves on.

Plus its "ten-tenths".. and given a fair bit of what is posted there is complete crap, I checked the "care factor meter" and it came up as follows:



Dave

[Ric Cary]

Its really quite simple an Australian distributor for a well known Antipodean manufacturer of race wear lost the distribution rights. They then started to manufacture their own suits under a label starting with O this company also has race wear manufactured under licence by an italian company starting with S but due to distribution agreements does not sell suits in Australia, the Australian distributor aluded to above " borrowed" some FIA approval numbers for their suits which were clearly labeled with the O brand...ooops, some hawk eyed scrutineer who may or may not have had a tip off picked up that the approval number did not match the Brand and suit description .......naughty, very naughty!!! So its very very unlikely you will be able to buy these suits anywhere they were made as a "supply" arrangement for some of the supercar teams.

[Lucky67]

Originally Posted by Marcus

SUITGATE????

Oh FFS, enough with the gates.

/end personal aggrivation

+1 for the Gates too.
After all, it was political leaks & spies at the Watergate Hotel people

Based on how the ....gates get bandied about, the statement structure would indicate it was a conspriracy about Water

[legend]

Originally Posted by Ric Cary

Its really quite simple an Australian distributor for a well known Antipodean manufacturer of race wear lost the distribution rights. They then started to manufacture their own suits under a label starting with O this company also has race wear manufactured under licence by an italian company starting with S but due to distribution agreements does not sell suits in Australia, the Australian distributor aluded to above " borrowed" some FIA approval numbers for their suits which were clearly labeled with the O brand...ooops, some hawk eyed scrutineer who may or may not have had a tip off picked up that the approval number did not match the Brand and suit description .......naughty, very naughty!!! So its very very unlikely you will be able to buy these suits anywhere they were made as a "supply" arrangement for some of the supercar teams.

I heard that ARCOM is rushing through a mandate for them to be used as control suits in the ARC.

[afifield]

It seems that this may have something to do with a 5 week wait for any customisation on Aus made suits.