https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/for ... ungen-w15/The engineers' hands are somewhat tied with the W14 this season. The chassis with the upstream upper crash structure restricts them. Changing it during the season would cost a lot of money. Which would be difficult to reconcile with the budget cap. In this context, the engineers like to point out that a chassis conversion during the season would also be too expensive.
James Allison: "Changing the geometry would be self-mutilation. It would distract from more important things."
Mercedes is sort of caught in the concept trap. You won't get out there until 2024 at the earliest. It is said that the engineers are confident. That they know what to do. They have already fallen flat on their face twice with their ground effect car.
In 2022, Mercedes failed because the ground clearance was too low. Bouncing threw the apparent wind tunnel world champion off track. For 2023, the Mercedes engineers misanticipated. They underestimated the effect of the floor edges that were bent up by 15 millimeters.
As a result, they designed the aerodynamics of the W14 for more ground clearance. Red Bull did the opposite and went down. Since the Monaco upgrade, Mercedes has been trying to gradually reduce ground clearance.
The relapse certainly has something to do with a bloodletting in the technical office in recent years. Even if the Mercedes managers deny it. But if you lose good engineers, you have to feel it at some point. Pointed aerodynamics are no longer as easy to smooth out as they used to be. Mercedes was still the benchmark in terms of mechanics for the old cars.
Going into 2024 with practically a brand-new car will also mean there will be lots of bumps to smooth out over the course of the season, while teams such as Ferrari, Mclaren, AM, and RBR would have already accumulated a decent amount of important feedback and correlation data between tracks, tires, and simulator during their 2022 and 2023 campaign to help improve their design and strategy for 2024. Come next year, we will see other teams pulling out new innovative upgrades to extract performance while Merc will be focusing on what they should have done in 2022 or 2023.pursue_one's wrote: ↑25 Jul 2023, 20:59https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/for ... ungen-w15/The engineers' hands are somewhat tied with the W14 this season. The chassis with the upstream upper crash structure restricts them. Changing it during the season would cost a lot of money. Which would be difficult to reconcile with the budget cap. In this context, the engineers like to point out that a chassis conversion during the season would also be too expensive.
James Allison: "Changing the geometry would be self-mutilation. It would distract from more important things."
Mercedes is sort of caught in the concept trap. You won't get out there until 2024 at the earliest. It is said that the engineers are confident. That they know what to do. They have already fallen flat on their face twice with their ground effect car.
In 2022, Mercedes failed because the ground clearance was too low. Bouncing threw the apparent wind tunnel world champion off track. For 2023, the Mercedes engineers misanticipated. They underestimated the effect of the floor edges that were bent up by 15 millimeters.
As a result, they designed the aerodynamics of the W14 for more ground clearance. Red Bull did the opposite and went down. Since the Monaco upgrade, Mercedes has been trying to gradually reduce ground clearance.
The relapse certainly has something to do with a bloodletting in the technical office in recent years. Even if the Mercedes managers deny it. But if you lose good engineers, you have to feel it at some point. Pointed aerodynamics are no longer as easy to smooth out as they used to be. Mercedes was still the benchmark in terms of mechanics for the old cars.
It's been reported a few places, but no details on what will change though!organic wrote: ↑26 Jul 2023, 21:14Not sure if previously stated/known but seems updates are coming at Spa
https://www.planetf1.com/news/toto-wolf ... -mercedes/
Very clear here how different Mercedes are from Ferrari and Red bull concepts.
One of the mclarens suffered floor damage which ruined its race.
The Merc was definitely faster than the McLaren towards the end of the race. Kinder on its tyres and better on low fuel. Lewis finished like 5 seconds behind Norris despite the bad start and losing a lot of time doing excessive tyre management in the middle of the race. They also had cooling issues necessitating lift and coast, which was exaggerated when behind other cars early in the race. All in all, had Lewis stayed in first or second on the first lap he likely would've finished second.mzivtins wrote: ↑27 Jul 2023, 13:43One of the mclarens suffered floor damage which ruined its race.
If that wasn't the case then Mercedes would have likely been behind both McLarens, not the other way round.
There is a glaring pace deficit between McLaren and Mercedes, and a lot of people may be forgetting that it is Hamilton driving this car and exactly what that means in terms of pace... We are talking about the fastest formula driver to exist so far, he is making the mercedes look better than it is, lets not forget this and temper expectations
They got the cooling calcs wrong, so their clear air pace was slightly above what it would have been if they got it right, but their early and mid race pace was worse.Cs98 wrote: ↑27 Jul 2023, 14:04The Merc was definitely faster than the McLaren towards the end of the race. Kinder on its tyres and better on low fuel. Lewis finished like 5 seconds behind Norris despite the bad start and losing a lot of time doing excessive tyre management in the middle of the race. They also had cooling issues necessitating lift and coast, which was exaggerated when behind other cars early in the race. All in all, had Lewis stayed in first or second on the first lap he likely would've finished second.mzivtins wrote: ↑27 Jul 2023, 13:43One of the mclarens suffered floor damage which ruined its race.
If that wasn't the case then Mercedes would have likely been behind both McLarens, not the other way round.
There is a glaring pace deficit between McLaren and Mercedes, and a lot of people may be forgetting that it is Hamilton driving this car and exactly what that means in terms of pace... We are talking about the fastest formula driver to exist so far, he is making the mercedes look better than it is, lets not forget this and temper expectations
