Mercedes demonstrated their decision to opt for a more traditional design path with their reveal of the W15.
The radical design of one area of the W15 has drawn the attention of experts. F1 tech analyst Craig Scarborough notes significant inventive efforts, particularly highlighting the innovative design of the front wing spotted on the W15.
Per PlanetF1, Scarborough on his appearance on Peter Windsor’s YouTube channel, provided an in-depth technical analysis of the W15, focusing particularly on what he has termed the Mercedes ‘3.1’ front wing.
This naming convention stems from the significant reduction of the fourth required element of the wing. Scarborough expressed his belief that this design innovation is “legal” and does not substantially alter performance levels.
However, he pointed out that the primary objective of this front wing design is to create outwash, a feature the new regulations aimed to minimize to facilitate closer trailing of cars and thereby enhance overtaking chances.
“I think of all the teams, you can see that Mercedes have made some progress with the car,” Scarborough began.
“They’ve been very open about the problems that they’ve had, so it looks as though, now back under [technical director] James Allison’s full control, they seem to be making the right sort of noises and the right steps. So fingers crossed for them that we get a more competitive year.
“The problems with the car last year were that it had a very weak rear axle, a very hard to control car. The suspension wasn’t very well matched to the underfloor and [Lewis] Hamilton didn’t like the seating position.
“So kind of the big thing that I notice about the car or I know about the car from what they’ve been saying, is they’ve changed the layout of the car. And this includes the ‘zero-pods’, we’ll talk about the sidepods a bit later, but they’ve changed the layout.
“So they’ve moved the cockpit further backwards along the wheelbase. They’ve changed the rear suspension set-up and no doubt they’ve done a huge amount of work on the springs and the dampers and getting the suspension to match the performance of the floor, which has kind of been their biggest flaw completely overall of the past two years ignoring every other little design detail. Fundamentally, that’s what they’ve struggled with.
“And James Allison has said: ‘We’ve addressed those areas. We’ve put a big amount of development, a lot of our money and aero resources into those areas’.
“When I first looked at the car, I think the first post I put on social media is Mercedes have gone conventional, the car looks, from a top-down view, very conventional in its layout. There’s no weird sidepods, there’s no other sort of weird, unique sort of elements to it.
“So at first maybe my heart sank a bit that we’ve seen McLaren and Ferrari both with very generative cars, rather than something that’s a lot more radical.
“But actually, when you start to look at some of the detail on the W15, it does start to get quite interesting and shows that they’re not just kind of copying what Red Bull and Alpine and Aston Martin, everyone else has kind of done over the past couple of years. They’ve really got some unique ideas.
“Probably the first one is yeah, we’ll talk about the sidepods, because everybody looks at that straight away.
“Again, as I say, the floor is more important, but they’re not showing us photos of that! So the sidepods, they’ve now got rid of that very strange, detached front section and the ‘zero-pod’ section at the back. That’s allowed them to kind of repackage the car and that’s what’s allowed the cockpit to move backwards.
“And while it looks like a fairly conventional undercut sidepod, it’s quite radical. You’ve got kind of a P-shaped inlet, creating a really big undercut, really working the front edge of the floor. And then you have the usual sort of downwash and gulleys, but a very, very deep undercut under the sidepod all the way down.
“The frontal view really shows you the amount of space they’ve got under the radiators on the sidepods and this is all about floor performance. You’re kind of giving up volumes and shapes of radiators and things in order to get the floor edge and the diffuser exits working so much better.
“No doubt they’re going to add lots of bits to the floor on the floor edge as we get through testing, but that’s what we’ve seen so far.
“Because the ‘zero-pod’ had such an effect on particularly the size and shape of the fuel tank, that kind of pushed the fuel up and pushed everything outwards. I think they’re going back to a much less compromised design. So I think they’ve kind of done the right thing in that respect…
“Now, Merc seem to have found a way of re-energising that vortex by having this, I call it the 3.1 wing, because it’s not a three-element wing and it’s not a four-element wing. So if you’ve got about point one of a wing there somewhere, and as I can read the regulations, it’s legal.
“I’m sure the other teams will have looked at these ideas previously and have discounted them, but I think there will be some discussion about this amongst the FIA, F1 and the teams saying: ‘If this is introducing outwash, is this something we want in the sport again? Haven’t we worked so hard to kind of get rid of the problems of cars following each other?’
“So I think that while it isn’t a big performance differentiator for the W15, I think it is something that will just kind of capture people’s imagination and start to get [them] talking. I’m sure there’ll be some conspiracy theories and bits and pieces with people saying that it’s illegal, but as far as I can see, it’s a cheeky, but permissible way of playing with the front wing.”
The Silver Arrows were unable to complete their shakedown at the Silverstone due to unfavourable weather conditions thus will be heading to Bahrain on Tuesday before the official testing for all teams begins.
