Thread by @dr_obbs

Ok so I had questions like many about the legality of the new @MercedesAMGF1 #W14b spec floor winglet. With the help of some friends, I did a bit of digging into the regulations to understand this better. A 🧵@Formula_Nerds @AlbertFabrega

The regulation boxes are sometimes super confusing so it's best to start with an overview of them. The below link is a good place to start to understand the regulation boxes where engineers can design within. Each reg box is controlled differently. 🧵racecar-engineering.com/articles/tech-…

So after looking at the reg boxes, these aero features can only be in these potential volumes, Front Chassis, Mid Chassis, Floor body, Floor fence, or Rear Body Work Sidepod. So now lets eliminate them 1 by 1. First it can't be fence, because these aren't floor fences 🧵

It can't be floor body, because surely they have maximized the regulation volume for the floor and did not sacrifice this critical area for a few flick-ups. And the canard is no way in this volume. So what about RBW SidePod? 🧵

Looking at the regulations, it would have to be pretty far outboard to be in the sidepod volume, and this is a heavily regulated region as well. Heavy radius regulations that these would violate. So couldn't be this. 🧵

Only thing left is the Front and Mid chassis volumes. Looking in Issue 6 of the 2023 technical regulations, you can see there are some convexity and concavity controls in the forward chassis, but in the mid? Virtually nothing! It just has to fit in the reg box!

So asking around, it seems that this is the same regulation box that is allowing teams to use winglets around the cockpit to manage cockpit losses. So pretty much anything is fair game as long as it fits in the regulation box. So how do these on the Merc fit? 🧵

Well, if you were to sacrifice a bit of your chassis front and mid volumes to create a slim no-pod type design, then you would be left with some volume to create canards and winglets! It's an open reg box to include these features, and this is how I believe these are legal. 🧵

The only downside, is that you can't extend these further out and away from the body towards the floor edge. You can see this when you observe just how close the winglet is to the chassis bodywork. 🧵

So according to my review, this new winglet, like the canard, is legal. How much they help, is unknown to anyone who doesn't have the CFD. But there must be some gains for them to have them there. Thanks to my "nameless" helpers, and I hope you enjoyed this explainer thread!