"Part of it is our normal iterative development," Fallows said of the Aston Martin updates. "We like to bring things into as many races as possible. We have a lot of people doing a huge amount of work to try and add performance to the car as we go along. But there is no secret that we have some features of the car that we are not particularly happy with. We want to make the car much more consistent. We have seen that there is some glimmer of good performance, either in certain conditions, with the tyres or in qualifying, but it's that consistency that we don't seem to be able to find on a variety of circuits. And the drivers have very clear ideas of what they need and what they want. So we are in a kind of constant search to try to bring those things to help them."
Regarding the efforts to address the consistency issue, Aston Martin's technical director added: "It's something we've all worked very hard on, the people in the factory have worked tirelessly to get this update here. It's been an incredible effort to get the package we have here today, which is just trying to improve the consistency, the adaptability, the ability to set the car up in these different conditions and still get similar performance, similar results. We want to make sure that the drivers, when they take corner after corner, have that consistency, feel that confidence in the car, because that confidence is worth so much lap time. And that's exactly what we focused on. We come across a variety of types of corners, types of circuits, environmental conditions, there are so many different variables that come into play. And when you have aerodynamics, with these regulations, which are basically quite sensitive, then it's very difficult to get it right for all those different conditions. And that's something that we constantly struggle with. And we want to make sure that when we add performance to the car, we don't degrade any of those particular circumstances."
Fallows pointed out that it is not easy to optimise cars with the current ground effect regulations. "It is a complex interaction not only with aerodynamics, but also with the way it works with the suspension, which is very complicated," he said. "The floors are very sensitive in terms of the way they behave. The aerodynamics under the floor is very sensitive to ride height in some conditions. So to achieve that is a tricky balance. And the other thing is that we are all trying to increase the performance of our cars. And sometimes you might get nine things you want to do, and then it's the tenth thing that trips you up. So we're really trying to make sure that whenever we put something on the car, it does exactly what we want it to do under all conditions. But sometimes it doesn't always work out that way."
Fallows acknowledged that avoiding rebounds is still a key factor with today's cars, as Ferrari has discovered. "I think it's always difficult to strike a balance with these regulations," said the Aston Martin technical director. "There's some interaction between the different levels. These are very strong ground effect cars. But you also have to be able to make the suspension system work with the ground, to avoid these kinds of bouncing conditions. I think every car, to a certain extent, will do that. It's just a question of how acceptable it is when it starts to become a problem. And it's not the only factor in designing a bottom or designing the cars, but it's definitely something you have to be aware of, that if you start introducing too much of it, then it's going to hurt you."
https://formu1a.uno/it/aston-martin-fal ... complessa/
It seems to me that these last twelve months since Canada last year were in effect a forced learning course, the hard way around. But hopefully this will translate into better results in the future now that they start to get the hang of it