Christian Horner reveals why Red Bull 'are extremely confident' of winning appeal

Ricciardo finished second in Melbourne, but was disqualified after the race when the stewards ruled that his RB10 had repeatedly exceeded the fuel flow limit of 100kg/h.

Red Bull immediately announced that they would appeal the decision and the FIA's International Court of Appeal will hear the case on April 14.

"We are appealing on the grounds that we do not believe, we are extremely confident, that we have not broken the rules, that we haven't exceeded the 100kg/h of fuel that is permitted to be utilised by the car and the engine," Horner told Sky Sports News' Rachel Brookes.

"So that was the reason for our appeal, we feel we have a strong case and it will be down to the appeal court to ultimately decide."

The World Champions argument centres on the wording of the FIA's Technical Regulations with Article 5.1.4 stating "Fuel mass flow must not exceed 100kg/h". However, as it does not say that this reading has to come from the FIA's sensor Red Bull feel they can use their own measurements to prove they did not breach the regulations.

"Our whole case is on the fact of which reading is correct," the Team Principal added.

"We have a sensor that is drifting and isn't reading correctly versus a fuel rail that we know is calibrated and we know that hasn't varied throughout the weekend and has subsequently been checked and found to be not faulty and hasn't moved or varied at all since it was installed on the car prior to the weekend.

"Our argument is very simple - that we haven't broken the Technical Regulations. That we haven't exceeded the fuel flow limit and that the sensor, which hopefully we will be able to demonstrate in the appeal, is erroneous.

"I think the problem with the Technical Directive is that as we have seen in the Pirelli tyre case or the double diffuser days, that the directive, as it now states on the bottom of the directive, is the opinion of the Technical Delegate - it is not a regulation, it is not regulatory, it is purely an opinion.

"We are bound by the Technical and Sporting Regulations. 5.1.4 of the Technical Regulations says you must not exceed 100kg/h of fuel usage - we haven't done that. Therefore our view is we haven't broken the regulations and Technical Directives are of non-regulatory value."

Red Bull will contest both the Malaysia and Bahrain grands prix before their case is heard and Horner refused to reveal what system they will use to measure their fuel flow in those races.

"Hopefully we will have a sensor that works and works in line with the fuel rail and there isn't this discrepancy," he said.

"Fundamentally that is the most important thing and if there is a variance or a drift it is something that we will obviously have to discuss with the FIA and we probably won't be alone in that."