Have recent updates stunted Mercedes’ W16 progress?

Mercedes has made a number of changes to the W16 in the aftermath of the revised front wing load and deflection tests and have seemingly slipped backwards, relative to their competitors in doing so.

George Russell’s comments echo this in the aftermath of the Belgian Grand Prix, acknowledging that a fifth place finish was a solid result but the car didn’t perform to the level he expected.

Mercedes W16: Back to the drawing board?

Firstly, Mercedes introduced a revised front wing arrangement at the Belgian Grand Prix, likely in order to tackle the challenges posed by the circuit, as they were keyed towards adjusting the outwash being generated by the wing which subsequently alters the behaviour of the wake shed by the tyre behind and how that impinges on the performance of the floor.

The overall design of the wing remains intact, with the alteration coming to the distribution of the mainplane and second element where they meet with the endplate, as can be seen in the two insets.

The revised layout has a much shorter mainplane where it connects with the endplate, extending the secondary element and resulting in a change to the airflow’s behaviour ahead of their vane and semi-detached flap assembly that lie behind them.

It’s likely that Mercedes had brought this update to the Belgian Grand Prix as an optional solution for this and similar events remaining on the calendar, whereas the previous solution may return at venues requiring more of a high-medium downforce setup, such will be the difference in the outwash they both generate.

A lack of forward progress during the race for Russell, in conditions that might otherwise seem ideal for Mercedes, seems to have amplified his concerns over the team’s development direction since the Spanish Grand Prix.

Russell said: “Because these conditions today, you would argue, are ideal for us in our car, and once again, it’s been the worst performance of the season. So yeah, we’re going to have a big sit down this week and try to figure it out.

“We went in a slightly different direction afterwards to sort of tackle the issue of the change of front wing. And clearly since that point, we’ve taken a big step backwards.

“So it could be as simple as just reverting back to something that we had earlier in the season. Of course, you can’t do that with the front wing, but in terms of the rest of the setup.”

Post Spain hangover?

Mercedes didn’t actually list any changes to their front wing at the Spanish Grand Prix, as the team had already made changes at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, albeit all of the visual alterations that had been made were subtle and seemingly more about altering the load characteristics of the wing.

However, they did also make changes to the front suspension fairings, taking a similar design direction to some of their rivals, who have also chosen to create wing section profiles at the chassis end of the fairings.

Thereafter, their development has been interspersed with a series of solutions aimed at improving their cooling range, be it brakes or power unit related, whilst the primary performance updates have focused on their floor, in order that the revised flow it receives from the car’s front end can be better utilised.

This began at the Spanish Grand Prix, where they made changes to the floor fence configuration and introduced an interim edge wing design, before changing it again a race later in Canada.

The solutions presented at both the Spanish and Canadian Grand Prix are similar in terms of length when it comes to the upturned section at the front of the assembly but, they differ quite considerably when it comes to the camber being utilised and the angle of depth used for the vanes mounted upon them.

If Mercedes are to look at circling back to older specifications, this, along with the aforementioned floor fence arrangement, might be their first port of call.

However, it could just be that the front wing used at the beginning of the season was doing some of the heavy lifting and their developments since then haven’t resolved the issues raised in its absence.

Meanwhile, their rivals have done a better job, be it with their front wing, or with the rectification work being done to their floor.

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