Mercedes W15

[ringo]

The old wing may have used a philosophy with a weaker up wash from the wing going downstream to the floor and undercut. That is a smaller wake.
The new wing has more elements and gaps, so should in theory have a stronger up wash behind the wing and a taller wake. To adapt to this the floor entry was raised it seems.
Whatever they were thinking with the first wing was probably one of those overcompensations Russel was talking about.
It may have been in aid to have lower drag over the wing and also a less peaky floor with a lower opening.
Now they're going more aggressive. Just my opinion.

[mkay]

Were both cars driven with all the new upgrades in first practice?

Lewis used the old front wing, Russell used the new one

Okay, why didn't both cars use new front wings?

Ted on Sky just confirmed that they've only got 1 of the new spec, and it was agreed that George would run with it.

[Jdn1327]

I see they've gone with a more conventional 4th plane as the other teams. Maybe to settle the vortices created by the old spec wing?

[zibby43]

I see they've gone with a more conventional 4th plane as the other teams. Maybe to settle the vortices created by the old spec wing?

That plus greater capacity to balance out/set up the car, per the team.

[OO7]

performance is what counts, however that new front wing looks ugly.

[Vanja #66]

Very small frontal area with the new wing, yet seems to balance the big one in the rear just fine. Mercedes front wing aero team has some great minds working there! Always coming up with new details, tricks and clever rule interpretation

[zioture]

[Just_a_fan]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GOXibVpWkAE ... =4096x4096

Funny that they only point at the rear flap when the entire design of the front wing is different - the first and second elements are massively different, the endplate connections are different, etc..

[Cocles]

So the vortex wing is gone for Monaco. If they keep using this new wing from now on, it confirms vortex wing was part of the problem, jusr as we started suspecting since Japan

Well, don't we already know that? It turned out the vortex wing (in certain, specific situations) creates way more downforce than shown in the simulations. When this unexpected downforce would suddenly kick in, it'd throw the car off balance. I suspect the clock has been ticking on the vortex wing since Australia; wasn't that when they had a ton of downforce meters running on the car? I remember them coming away saying they had discovered something significants from that data they gathered. The iterations of the front wing after Australia all look like they're trying to peel that unexpected downforce off.

[Jdn1327]

Very small frontal area with the new wing, yet seems to balance the big one in the rear just fine. Mercedes front wing aero team has some great minds working there! Always coming up with new details, tricks and clever rule interpretation

https://cdn-2.motorsport.com/images/mgl ... 1-w15.webp

https://cdn-2.motorsport.com/images/mgl ... 1-w15.webp

Vanja, is this to provide a more consistent air flow to the entrance of the floor? Or is it just to make the setup window wider?

[Sevach]

Cars will stay on different specs for FP3.

[Vanja #66]

Vanja, is this to provide a more consistent air flow to the entrance of the floor? Or is it just to make the setup window wider?

That's a very specific question, outside the team I don't think anyone could say with anything close certainty. I think they'd want to achieve both for sure, but the way these two wings work is probably so very different and I have no idea how both of them seem to work well in Monaco. It was confirmed it will only be the new spec on both cars from Canada on.

[ringo]

The new one looks less pitch sensitive.
And should work better with the various front suspension setups; rear control arms and all.
I am just basing this off the location of slot gaps between the profiles.
Mor even chord lengths and shorter chords effectively. 4 vs 3 resulting in more flow energy at the low pressure side.
Should work well at a wider range of AoA.

[Sevach]

But as the team has come to understand the weaknesses of its car – which has proved especially tricky to deliver peak performance in both high and low speed corners – it has come to the conclusion that it needs to pursue a different design direction for its car.

An important element of this is a new front wing that it hopes can help better balance the car through the various speed ranges, as well as deliver more outwash. George Russell has run with this new design in Monaco.

The whole article here.
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/merc ... /10615765/

[TimW]

Very small frontal area with the new wing, yet seems to balance the big one in the rear just fine. Mercedes front wing aero team has some great minds working there! Always coming up with new details, tricks and clever rule interpretation

They are king of finding loopholes, but it almost seems they are exploiting loopholes for the sake of exploiting loopholes. With the old FW, like the zero pod, the wow factor is bigger than the results on track.