Guardians of safety:

Test drivers Kossi and Varis

The job of a test driver is one of the most responsible and demanding in the plant. During the development work lots of test material about the tyres is gathered: the test drivers’ descriptions, comments and grades are complemented by the unchallengeable numerical values from equipment, devices and stopwatches.

- We grade the tyres just like in school. We evaluate how they perform and behave. There are so many things that cannot be measured using equipment. For example the road response on a bare road cannot be measured. Then there are those things that can be measured such as cockpit or pass-by noise, explain Nokian Tyres’ test drivers Hannu Kossi and Tomi Varis.

Testing of winter tyres is concentrated at our own, unique Ivalo test centre. The test period lasts close to six months; it generally starts in October and continues long into the spring.

- A typical day at the Ivalo test centre might involve about 20 changes of tyres. Tests are driven in 10-15 minute cycles, then the wheels are changed and the same thing repeats again and again. Wheels, driving, wheels, driving.

Real conditions, credible results

You cannot be convinced of a tyre’s safety around a desk. The work has to be done in real conditions, to make it credible. The essential trips that are needed for testing are a part of the test driver’s job description. It has to be accepted as well as the never ending changing of wheels.

- We have to serve the end user, the consumer. The objective is drivability, a tyre that is safe for the user, says Hannu Kossi who has trained and inducted almost the whole team of test drivers to their precise and systematic work. He came to the test department at the tyre factory over 38 years ago. The work of a test driver is lonely and independent. Everyone has their own projects, their own tests to drive. The older ones respects the skills of the younger ones and vice versa. Behind tyre development projects and individual tests there is a major mission, the real job. You can’t lose sight of that in the speed, rush nor the daily routine.

- The test drivers have to concentrate and have their wits about them. It takes more and more to find the differences between tyres. Driving and the physics – that has to be routine. Of course you have to be able to drive a car and you have to know how it behaves because the speeds are fast. The information gathered from the tests has to be passed on to the people who make the decisions, describe Kossi and Varis the requirements for the job.