Autosport · সাধারণ

Mercedes explains why its upgrade made its F1 car harder to drive

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The upgrades delivered the extra downforce Mercedes was targeting, but not the consistently across all conditions. The resulting shift in aero balance pushed the W17 too far towards the front, narrowing its operating window. The team's focus is now on set-up changes to find a better balance to unlock the car's potential

If Mercedes left Sepang with more questions than answers, the Singapore Grand Prix weekend finally provided the engineering team with the first real clues to unlocking their new package. Although it was a sprint weekend, the reopening of parc ferme and the decision to split configurations between the two drivers offered a valuable opportunity to experiment and gather critical data.

The data will be analysed during the break ahead of Austin, with one key goal: understanding exactly why the package introduced in Malaysia hasn’t properly worked as expected, despite the potential to extract. Mercedes has now confirmed a crucial piece of the puzzle, explaining that the upgrades shifted the car's aerodynamic balance, making the W17 significantly more difficult to drive.

While the new package achieved its primary objective of increasing overall downforce, as shown through Malaysia’s high-speed sections, it also exposed an unexpected weakness. The upgrades shifted the W17’s aerodynamic balance too far forward, unsettling the car and significantly narrowing its operating window.

"I think, if you wanted to just take the first order of the problem, we wanted to deliver more performance with more downforce. And we have measured more downforce on the car," explained Mercedes deputy technical director Simone Resta on the team's Nu Silver Arrows Radio Show podcast.

"Unfortunately, it's not a black and white problem. It's not zero one. It's a very grey environment with multiple variables. And I think we delivered the downforce but perhaps we haven't delivered the same level of downforce in every single running point of the car on the track. And that is then starting to alter a little bit the balance of the car in the condition, and then the driver has to adapt."

The balance has shifted toward the front-end

To some extent, a shift in balance was to be expected given the extent of the floor and sidepod changes introduced in Sepang. The real issue, however, was that while Mercedes successfully unlocked the additional downforce it had been targeting, those gains were not delivered consistently across the full range of operating conditions, contrary to expectations. As a result, the engineers struggled more than usual to identify a set-up capable of extracting the full potential of the updated W17.

Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes

Photo by: Alastair Staley / LAT Images via Getty Images

“There are a few things we need to sort out, especially because we tend to see a car with more balance than before. Stronger front, even perhaps a bit more than we expected. So therefore, you need to re-centre the window we operate the car. And it's taking some time,” added Resta, emphasising that there is still untapped potential in the new specification.

This means Mercedes now has to approach both set-up and driving requirements differently to unlock the car's potential, while the W17 has become less forgiving and harder to drive when operating outside its ideal window. There is more performance to unlock, but accessing it consistently has become a far more complex task and the shift in balance has also made the car harder to drive.

During the first half of the season, one of the W17's strengths was its stable rear end, particularly in traction-limited situations. That strength often made Mercedes competitive and the benchmark at stop-and-go tracks, not only thanks to its power unit but also because of its ability to put power down effectively on corner exit from low-speed corners.

The rear is less stable under braking and this change the approach

However, the balance shift has also forced changes in driving technique. Antonelli, in particular, has always favoured an aggressive approach to corner entry, aiming to minimise the distance through the corner, gain time at the apex and getting back on the throttle as early as possible.

That approach worked brilliantly up to this point, partly because the previous specification provided a stable rear end that remained settled under braking, allowing him to attack corner entry. The new package, however, changed some of the W17's key characteristics and that stability.

As a result, the drivers have had to adapt their approach both at turn-in and through the mid-corner phase. Unsurprisingly, Antonelli reported persistent mid-corner understeer during both the Malaysia and Singapore weekends, stemming from an inability to rotate the car as cleanly as he would like on entry. That compromised his line through the apex and delayed throttle application on corner exit.

Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes

Photo by: Clive Mason / Getty Images

A narrower window, but there is more potential to extract

To compensate for that understeer, drivers are left with two choices: increase steering input, which places additional load on the front tyres, or use the throttle to rotate the car at mid-corner, something that was frequently visible in Sepang. However, on a hot and abrasive track, however, the latter approach comes at a cost, as it accelerates rear tyre overheating and degradation. As a result, the updated W17 struggled considerably more than usual in Sepang's low-speed corners.

It therefore came as little surprise that, once parc ferme restrictions were lifted after the sprint race in Singapore, Mercedes shifted towards a significantly different set-up compared to the first part of the weekend. The direction chosen for qualifying and the race ultimately paid off, trying to find a more stable rear end.

Early indications of this had already emerged during the wet sprint: “The car was overbalanced initially, quite oversteer-y, difficult to drive. As the front tyres wore down, suddenly we found a much happier car balance. And then from there, Kimi suddenly was popping up with green and purple sectors and starting to match the pace of the leaders," said deputy team principal Bradley Lord.

The improvement was also evident on the timing sheets. Despite slower track conditions on Saturday, Antonelli was one of only two drivers in the top 10, alongside Hamilton, to improve on his Friday qualifying time. Most of that gain was found in sector two, the most technical part of the lap, where the set-up changes gave him the confidence to push harder and unlock more of the updated W17's potential.

For Austin, Mercedes will re-introduce the front wing tested during Singapore practice, aiming to recalibrate the package, widen the operating window, and extract the potential from the car the car: "We just have to re-centre the window. We just have to rework mechanically the car, trying to tweak a few of the characteristics that we're seeing with these packets on the car,” said Resta.