Mercedes a amélioré les performances de la W14 grâce à une nouvelle suspension avant, en permettant notamment une meilleure stabilité en entrée de virage. Toutefois, cette évolution a dû être adaptée aux contraintes du plafond budgétaire, ce qui a obligé l’équipe à faire des compromis. Andrew Shovlin, responsable de l’ingénierie de piste de Mercedes, indique que la suspension arrière sera au centre de l’attention lors du développement de la F1 2024 de Mercedes. Toto Wolff, directeur de l’équipe, estime que les designers doivent comprendre le fonctionnement de la W14 actuelle avant de se lancer dans d’autres modifications. Bien que Mercedes ait montré un potentiel amélioré avec cette évolution, le directeur ne veut pas s’emballer et préfère gérer les attentes de l’équipe.

Andrew Shovlin, the track engineering director of Mercedes, stated that the modification of the front suspension of the W14 has improved the overall performance of the car. Co-author: Jonathan Noble 25m Earlier this season, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell complained about a lack of confidence with the rear of the Mercedes W14, partly due to the advanced positioning of the cockpit compared to previous models. While Mercedes’ drivers will have to wait for a brand-new chassis to see this problem disappear, Mercedes has begun to address it with the introduction of an update at the Monaco Grand Prix, a new front suspension designed to work in tandem with the new pontoon concept, but also providing better stability. “It’s about trying to play with these geometries to have an influence on the aerodynamic platform and try to get a bit more stability on the car,” explains Andrew Shovlin, the track engineering director of Mercedes. “That has probably given us a bit more freedom because previously we were always struggling with having a good front end on the cornering and good stability on entry, flat on the brakes and turning.” “That compromise has always been something we couldn’t solve. We would always end up with a weak rear end on entry or a bad front end on the cornering. I hope it has moved us in the right direction.” Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes AMG Given that these new parts had to be adapted to the original concept and that they come in a context of a limited budget ceiling limiting development, a compromise had to be reached. That is why Shovlin expects the rear suspension to be at the center of attention in the development of the 2024 Mercedes F1. “Basically, we designed a new suspension this year,” he adds. “Changing suspensions is expensive. The reality is that with the budget ceiling, we’re still looking at the championship situation. We don’t know how much [modifications] we’ll make. I don’t expect us to make huge advances.” “We realized there was a fairly rich vein of development that we could start to investigate. These programs work, but the challenge is always to get the aerodynamics and the vehicle dynamics working in harmony and optimized. Every team works with these kinds of processes. It’s about seeing where the opportunities are and how to bring the two together to work as one.” Evolution: a “rush job” that worried Jerome d’Ambrosio, driver development director, Mercedes-AMG, Toto Wolff, Team Principal and CEO, Mercedes-AMG, Mick Schumacher, reserve driver, Mercedes-AMG With its updates, Mercedes seems to have a car with improved potential, as evidenced by the double podium at the Spanish Grand Prix, but director Toto Wolff believes it is important that designers understand the current W14 before embarking on further modifications. He justifies this by stating that the introduction of the update had raised some questions internally: the sustained development pace forced the team to conduct a less comprehensive analysis of the parts than usual. “We just have to keep working hard because what matters is not the competitiveness [of the update] but the level of our understanding,” he told Motorsport.com. “We were rushing things in the last two months, which worried us because it meant bypassing the process. But so far, it has paid off.” Furthermore, while he is convinced that the situation is different from last year when another good Spanish GP did not translate into pace, the director doesn’t want to get excited: “We need to manage our expectations. We were very upset during qualifying [of the Spanish GP] because we thought second and third places were achievable, and that wasn’t the case. So I don’t want to go to Canada and say it’s a second and third place [in qualifying] because it could just as well be a fifth and sixth place.” Read also: in an article which can rank high in google
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