Alpine seek solution over 'frustrating' failures

Alpine Team Principal Otmar Szafnauer is eager to resolve a "frustrating issue" that has caused two failures for the French marque this season.

Esteban Ocon retired from the British Grand Prix after nine laps due to a Hydraulic issue, while Pierre Gasly also suffered the same fate during practice for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

Gasly's car caught fire and led to an extensive repair job for his mechanics, which Ocon averted by stopping upon instruction at Silverstone.

Alpine want to understand root cause

Speaking to media including RacingNews365.com, Szafnauer explained: "Esteban had a hydraulic leak from the proprietary pump that we buy from our supplier.

"It's a part we buy and that's usually pretty robust and rarely fails. It leaked from an area of the pump where we adjust the pressure on it.

"On suppliers, we have a quality assurance program where we go out and review their quality processes and procedures, so that we're happy that when we get a part from them, that's gone through the right [process].

"But that's generally with suppliers where we supply them a design and they make a part to our design. We have that process in place so we can be assured that when we choose a supplier, they have all the quality operating systems in place.

"With big companies - that are even better at that kind of stuff - we don't. So if we buy wheels or if we buy ATL fuel cells or some of those components, this is one of them. They will go back, find the root cause, write a report, then show us what happened and tell us how it's never going to happen again."