Lotus to miss first two testing dates
The Finn said that the team, one of four new outfits to join the grid this season, have elected not to run at both Valencia and Jerez next month owing to a shortage of spare parts.
However, he did say the team would be able to test properly at Jerez for the third session, later in February.
"We are preparing as well as we can at this time," Kovalainen told the official Formula One website. "One thing is that we could possibly join an earlier test. The car would probably be able to run but we wouldn't have spare parts and we wouldn't be able to test properly.
"If we had any problems, the test would be over. So at the third test we know we'll be able to push the car hard. I can push it to the limit, get a feel for the car and hopefully we can do a lot of mileage.
"I expect the car to be pretty reliable straight out of the box because (Lotus chief technical officer)Mike (Gascoyne) and the design team are all experienced people who know how to build a race car. Then the question mark will be how much performance we have.
"When the factory's all set up and running we'll be able to get decent upgrades relatively quickly, and that's when we'll see the real performance."
Red Bull boss Christian Horner has already confirmed that his team will not head to the Circuit Ricardo Tormo as their RB6 will not be ready in time. Sky Sports