Dallara joins the fight against coronavirus

Dallara’s U.S. facility, which was opened in 2012, is using its cutting tables normally reserved to cut fiber cloth for racecars to prepare materials that will be used for face masks and gowns.

The materials are being delivered to the factory from an outside vendor and the Dallara staff cuts them for masks and gowns as needed, whereupon Indianapolis-based StitchWorks picks up the items twice a day and sews the material before delivering the finished product to hospitals.

StitchWorks houses industrial sewing machines and is joining forces with several groups in the Million Mask Challenge, which brings people together to create masks for those in the healthcare industry.

Stefano dePonti, CEO and general manager of Dallara USA, told IndyCar.com: “We need to be very active in everything we can to help, first of all, the medical cause and doctors, nurses and everyone involved, to fight this battle. As soon as this virus is defeated, the better for everybody.

“So, if we cannot properly build racecar parts, let’s do something that can help the community and move it forward with the hope that this will help many people that, right now, are suffering.”

DePonti said that Dallara’s corporate headquarters in Italy – a country that has been dreadfully struck by the coronavirus pandemic – is making ventilator parts and working with its aerodynamics team to test better ways to create oxygen flow.

He said he was inspired by that work, and he hopes that if their research is successful, he could implement the same work and technology in the Speedway factory.

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