EXCITING CONTENT weighed before transportation of course . You cannot just put any crate , of any size or any weight , anywhere inside an aircraft . So if you know the size just by recognising a crate ’ s unique number , once it is packed and weighed then you can out it in the right place to balance the airplane properly . The teams weigh the crates individually , and Dorna ’ s people do too . If any team is over their allowed total weight , they will get charged , around 15 Euros per kilo , so it is in everybody ’ s interest to get to the maximum allowed weight of all the team ’ s kit and little more . On Sunday night at Portimao , the final European round before the first longhaul of the year to Argentina , the teams packed up all their crates , labelled them and will next see them just before race weekend in Argentina . To save effort and time at the other end , some flight cases will have complete bikes in them , then lots - and lots - of other things will be packed in around them , usually including the riders ’ leathers ! For safety reasons the bikes are drained of oil , fuel , water the batteries have special transport needs . For a top level factory team , there could be as many as four complete bikes and four more engines travelling to the final two rounds of 2021 . The most efficient way to transport tools and spares ? Make the ‘ toolbox ’ the travel crate itself . Inside the Yamaha truck the bike spares are inside plastic trays , listed and organised to the ‘ nth ’ degree , but for flyaways those storage boxes under the workbenches in the track are actually flight cases . All you do is click the ‘ lids ’ on them to seal them up - but the lids click on the open side of the boxes - not the top - with heavy duty fasteners . A closer look at some mechanics ’ toolboxes that you can see on TV inside the pit garages , complete with their pull-out drawers and trays , are actually permanently built inside flight boxes . Put all the tools back in their little shaped foam holders , close the drawers and click the side-mounted lid on . Argentina here we come …! To make sure that the correct things go inside the correct flight cases , Ash , for example , tapes a laminated waterproof label of the expected contents of each box onto each and every box . That means that even if he is not around , other team staff can make sure that they pack things properly , in the places they know they will fit best . Hazardous materials are a whole different thing . Specialist supplier Panta provides several of the teams with their racing fuel and just for WordSSP and WorldSBK they will arrange transport to Argentina for around 1000 litres of their fuel , but not in the usual big drums you can see behind the pit garages . Special , smaller ones , with relief valves and other airplane specific safety precautions are needed . Yamaha , Elf fuel users , can get their fuel sent direct , and of course some people send their fuel by sea , as it is much less expensive than flying it . It just takes longer . Some teams even had race fuel left in Qatar from two years ago , when that round was suddenly cancelled as the Coronavirus pandemic took , because they had to pre-order it long before and literally ship it there . They just never got there to meet it . All this trailing stuff around the world can of course be made much easier if you do not have to trail it around at all . Some teams , depending on their partners and the flyaway country in question , can have disposables like brake cleaner , cleaning products , oil and so on brought on site , which saves a lot on air transportation of hazardous materials . Not taking something by air but sourcing it locally is also an option . A good one in many instances . Or even sending things by sea beyond the obvious pure racing things . Here are two extreme examples . David Bosser , the man in charge of the paddock and logistics for Dorna , explained one simple thing when giving greatly appreciated information to help write this story . “ The cost of air transport per kg is quite high . As an example to transport a pack of 500 sheets of paper ( which cost in a shop around 4.5 Euros ) around all the world ( Europe - Argentina - Indonesia - Europe ). At the end of the trip that cost would be around € 30 . So the conclusion is that is better to buy that pack of sheets directly on destination than transport it .” Take that idea to the extreme and pre-Covid the official Kawasaki racing team had three sets of hospitality equipment . From chairs and tables to cutlery . Yes , three . They worked out some years ago that it was cheaper for them to send their two travelling hospitalities between the overseas rounds by sea than it was to hire all the equipment on site a few times per year . One went east ( Chang in Thailand , Phillip Island Australia ) and the other west ( Laguna in the USA and Villicum in Argentina ). All the stuff fits in a sea container and the hospitality staff were flown in with the rest of the team . The costs saved on
“ It would have been possible to fly from Amsterdam to Argentina directly , but it would have been twice as expensive as it was two years ago .
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