PIC: Honda's carbon fibre swingarm

An unexpected technical development at the Thailand MotoGP test was a carbon fibre swingarm for Repsol Honda riders Marc Marquez and Dani Pedrosa.

Or at least we thought the development was new for Buriram…

Marquez said he first tried it back at the Valencia test in November, with Pedrosa's debut at the previous Sepang test. But they were able to keep it a secret until now.

"We are trying it at different circuits just a few times, not all the day, so we are able to compare well and decide well for the future because it is a new protoype from Honda and we are not 100 percent sure," said reigning champion Marquez.

Ducati has used a carbon fibre swingarm almost exclusively since the end of 2009 – Valentino Rossi tested a conventional aluminium design in 2012, but did not race it after chatter problems.

Crash.net was told the main benefit of a carbon fibre swingarm is that the same stiffness levels as aluminium can be achieved, but for less weight.

Initial reports suggested Marquez and Pedrosa both favoured the carbon fibre version over the normal aluminium design, but the riders themselves were giving little away.

"It was the same [version] as Sepang," said Pedrosa, who set the fastest lap of the test.

"It's quite a different thing. But it's just the first version so, also for the engineers, it's like a new style. We don’t have the experience with it yet and are just starting to get info about feelings.

"I've never ridden with one before. It's positive to have this new technology and Honda is working hard. That means they are willing to improve and help us, this is nice.

"There are positive and negatives but in general, it's a different character and for sure the first time you make one it's difficult to know if you make it correct, because the experience is not there.

"We will keep going to get more experience in the future.

"We first used it in Malaysia, but not a lot, so now we've tried it at two different tracks."

Marquez, who set the fourth quickest lap time but was again considered the rider to beat on race pace, gave a few more details of how it is working on track:

"The bike is shaking a little bit more. Looks like the grip is a little bit better [with the carbon swingarm], but then with the used tyre it’s shaking too much."

Aprilia is also rumoured to have a carbon swingarm in the pipeline for 2018.

KTM has been seen running a new, black swingarm in pre-season testing but the team said it was not made of carbon fibre.

Honda - like Ducati, Suzuki and KTM - also brought a new fairing to Thailand, which Marquez described as 'a better compromise' compared to the more extreme Sepang version.

However Pedrosa wasn't in favour, "It was not what we expect actually!"