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Mercedes didn’t want to show its 2021 floor to the rest of the Formula 1 paddock until it had to, and it’s easy to see why given the unusual approach taken.
On the front corner, it has separated the normally-continuous turned-up section on the outer edge into four segments – with another slightly less aggressive segment preceding that underneath the middle of the bargeboard area.
If you have one continuous section, the tendency because of the direction of the airflow will be for the rear part of it to work harder than the forward section. By separating it, you will improve the overall performance of it, but more importantly improve the performance further forward.
At the rear, to make the best from the regulation changes, Mercedes has got a small turned-up section on the floor surface itself. But on top of that, it also has another horizontal turning vane with angled separators.
The horizontal turning vane and separators will be an attempt to connect this part of the floor to the turning vanes that are mounted on the inside surface of the rear brake ducts, the lower of which have also been reduced in size for 2021.
The objective of all this is to reduce the amount of airflow that is pulled under the floor by the low pressure under the car and allow that low pressure to suck the car towards the ground, producing downforce from what is called ground effect.
Overall, it won’t be a big problem to research it and I am sure there are aerodynamicists at the other teams studying these same pictures. They will probably be running a model in CFD overnight tonight.
It’s immediately obvious from looking at other teams that the levels of complexity of the floors are extremely varied. Mercedes is at a different level, for now.
