Mercedes has unveiled their 2022 Formula 1 car, the W13, for the 2022 championship ahead of its on-track debut at Silverstone.
The defending constructors’ champions becomes the eighth team to be formally revealed ahead of the new season, and serves as the last model coming out of the front-running teams to launch.
Mercedes has returned to its classic silver livery for 2022 after racing with a black design for the past two years as part of its anti-racism messaging.
The car features black trim and the fluorescent green of title sponsor Petronas, as well as a star-speckled design on the engine cover.
This season marks the start of a new technical era for Formula 1 following a rewrite of the regulations that is aimed producing better racing, leading to a significant change in the aerodynamics.
Mercedes will enter the new season looking to continue its winning run of eight consecutive Formula 1 constructors’ titles stretching back to 2014.
The return of the Silver Arrows. ? Meet the Mercedes-AMG F1 W13 E Performance. ? pic.twitter.com/NsuEBvbkbK
— Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 Team (@MercedesAMGF1) February 18, 2022
“The mindset of the team has always been the same over the last few years, that the point count goes back to zero,” said Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff.
“There is nothing from the previous years that will make you win the current championship. No credits to be taken, but also no sense of entitlement.
“Like every year, we are sceptical, whether we have done a good enough job, and that is the right mentality.”
Mercedes will get a first chance to complete running with the W13 in a shakedown at Silverstone, which is limited to 100km or 17 laps of the track.
“For me, the two best moments every year is when you fire up for the first time, which happened very early for us in December, and then the second moment is when the car is being put together,” said Wolff.
“I was in the race bays the last few days, looking at this unbelievable machine, and now seeing it complete with its bodywork on is very exciting. It’s quite amazing, but I hope it’s amazing when we drive it in an hour.”
Lewis Hamilton will once again bid for a record-breaking eighth world championship this year, having lost out to Red Bull Racing rival Max Verstappen in controversial fashion on the last lap of the season in 2021 at Abu Dhabi.
“Going into this year, I haven’t set any goals initially,” said Hamilton. “I think naturally, every single individual within this team has worked towards the ultimate goal of winning the world championship, and again raising the bar and doing something that no-one else has done before.”
Hamilton is joined at Mercedes this year by new teammate George Russell, who becomes the first product of its junior programme to race for the senior team full-time after spending the last three years with Williams.
Our W13. ?❤️ pic.twitter.com/6fu1k0enA7
— Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 Team (@MercedesAMGF1) February 18, 2022
“There are so many faces that I’ve known over the past six or seven years now,” said Russell.
“When we started working together, we were straight into business. Obviously the relationships were always built over time, but I already knew so many of the people.
“Having worked with Lewis or seeing Lewis work when I was a junior driver, or sitting in the engineering meetings, that will also feel quite natural, being teammates with him and sitting alongside him.
“I think it’s going to be a really exciting season for all of us and Formula 1 generally.”
So an exciting partnership between Lewis Hamilton and George Russell. The Silver Arrows is fast and let’s see if Mercedes can fight back the title from rival Red Bull.
Official website:
https://www.mercedesamgf1.com/en/news/2022/02/introducing-w13-mercedes-amg-petronas-f1-team-challenger-2022/
Social media:
https://twitter.com/MercedesAMGF1/status/1494605340482093057
https://twitter.com/MercedesAMGF1/status/1494607216816627724
https://twitter.com/MercedesAMGF1/status/1494611943495245827
News stories:
https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article.mercedes-launch-hamilton-and-russells-championship-contender-the-w13.10qDf3lwvFRBwTnfpvZKb2.html
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/mercedes-explains-decision-to-return-to-silver-f1-livery-for-2022/8279061/
https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12433/12544971/mercedes-launch-new-car-for-f1-2022-title-bid-with-lewis-hamilton-raring-to-go-after-difficult-time
https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12433/12544955/mercedes-boss-toto-wolff-denies-lewis-hamilton-demanded-michael-masis-departure-to-remain-in-f1
https://www.skysports.com/watch/video/12545033/mercedes-unveil-new-silver-f1-w13
https://www.racefans.net/2022/02/18/first-pictures-mercedes-reveals-its-new-w13-f1-car-2022/
The seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton plays down Formula 1 exit talk after “stepping back” over winter break. Motorsport.com has the full story.
Lewis Hamilton has played down talk that he ever planned to walk away from Formula 1 – but said it was important he stepped back from things over the winter.
The world champion disappeared from the public spotlight after losing the championship last year following the FIA’s controversial handling of a late race safety car restart at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
Hamilton made no public comments about what happened in Abu Dhabi, as his Mercedes boss Toto Wolff made clear he was ‘disillusioned’ with everything that had happened.
That prompted concerns that Hamilton could elect to walk away from F1 after feeling that the sport had lost credibility because of what happened.
But appearing for the first time at the launch of the new Mercedes W13 at Silverstone on Friday, Hamilton explained that, while he needed to get away from everything for a while, he quickly concluded that he would come back in a fighting mood.
“I never, ever said that I was going to stop,” said Hamilton. “I love doing what I do, and it is such a privilege working with this large group of people.
“You really feel like you’re part of a team and part of a family, working towards that common goal. There’s no feeling quite like it.
“But yeah…it was obviously a difficult time for me, and it was a time where I really needed to take a step back and focus on being present. I had my family all around me, and creating great moments.
“And I eventually got to a point where I decided I was going to be attacking coming into another season, and working with Toto and George [Russell].
“It’s exciting seeing George come in and bringing his energy. I can already feel that throughout the team. I think it’s going to be an exciting season.”
The Mercedes launch comes one day after the FIA announced its response to the Abu Dhabi controversy.
As well as moving F1 race director Michael Masi aside, it is to set up a virtual race control room and tweak the safety car rules to prevent repeat problems in the future.
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff, who vowed to hold the FIA ‘accountable’ for its failings in Abu Dhabi, said he welcomed the governing body’s response.
“I think it’s very encouraging to see that action has been taken,” said Wolff at the launch of the team’s W13.
“There is a much more robust structure now and support structure for the racing director. The FIA has stated that there will be a virtual race control room, state of the art technology, and now we shall be going, the new guys are going to be in place for the Barcelona test. I think the right steps.”
Technical analysis courtesy from Formula1.com.
Long and slim is the overriding theme of the Mercedes W13. Although wheelbase has been limited to a maximum of 3,600mm under the 2022 regulations, the Mercedes design team has retained its favoured way of using the length of the car to package it narrowly.
Narrow pods, wide side channels
The narrow sidepods made possible by the packaging have two important aerodynamic implications.
It helps keep outwash generated further forward to stay outwashed. Because the underfloor is physically further away from the airflow coming off the front wing and front wheels, there is less chance of this turbulent flow being sucked beneath the floor from the side and reducing the effectiveness of the venturi tunnels, which generate around half of the car’s total downforce.
Secondly, it has created enormously wide side channels between the sidepod and the outer edge of the floor – way wider than on any other car revealed so far. This has created a very big volume for the air directed around the sidepods to meet up with the airflow exiting the tunnel diffuser. This will create a significant pressure differential between the top surface of the channel and the underfloor venturis, creating downforce.
In order to maximise the distance between the front axle and the beginning of the sidepods within the permitted wheelbase, the power unit seems to have been mounted a long way back (as also on the Mercedes-engined Aston Martin), implying a short gearbox casing. It can be seen how the engine airbox and the associated plumbing begins much further behind the cockpit than on, say, the Ferrari.
More aerodynamic details
Within this narrow sidepod/rearward-placed engine layout are several aerodynamic niceties.
The very long sidepods are extremely sophisticated in their shaping, with a significant undercut on the front corners spreading down the sides. There is a downward ramp, but only at the front, with the upper contours of the pods then rising gently upwards to the radiator exit at the back, roughly in parallel with the shape of the venturi tunnels further down.
The line of the lower bodywork seems to suggest that these tunnels feature a double kick, with a smaller expansion chamber part-way down their length before the full up-kick diffuser at the back.
The inlet for these tunnels appears to be tiny but much higher up than on other cars we’ve seen. This combination implies a strong suction effect into that tunnel, maximising the speed of the airflow through them as well as influencing the airflow around the inlet, which will allow it to be directed either towards those channels down the side or out-washed further out.
The long nose merges with the lower wing element in the way we’ve seen on most other cars, hanging below the nose with the second element merging into the nose’s sides. This will have been optimised to give the fastest, smoothest flow possible to the very hollowed-out underside of the nose, the negative pressure of which will be exerting a strong pull on the oncoming air.
The faster the air can be made to move in this forward part of the car, the more energy is available to feed the flow into the tunnels, the side channels and to the desired – but difficult to achieve under these regulations – outwash.
At the back it has been possible to fit in a small shark fin to aid with stability in yaw – as the direction of the car to the oncoming air changes in the early part of the corner, so that change is introduced more progressively onto the rear wing by that fin.
As would be expected of a Mercedes it looks an extremely well thought-out and sophisticated piece of kit, one with yet another very distinctive take on the new regulations.
George Russell found the Mercedes W13 Formula 1 car to be “very much in line” with how it felt in the simulator after completing an initial shakedown at Silverstone.
Following the launch of Mercedes’ new car on Friday morning, Russell was handed the first on-track outing in the W13 as part of a 100km shakedown permitted under the regulations.
Following his run, Russell handed the car over to teammate Lewis Hamilton, giving both Mercedes drivers a chance to sample the new model before the start of testing in Barcelona next week.
2022 marks the start of a new technical era for F1, with the shift in the aerodynamic philosophy of the cars leaving many unsure how they would feel on track, having only relied on simulator running up to now.
Russell’s running at Silverstone came during a heavy storm in the UK that has shut down a number of travel networks and resulted in wind gusts as high as 122mph.
The former Williams driver said the wind was “absolutely crazy”, but that he “managed to keep the car on the black stuff”.
“The car handled I would say largely as we expected, but equally with these conditions, in the wet and with the wind, there’s not a huge amount you can take with it,” Russell said.
“So far, we’re in a good place, and I think we’re in a good window ahead of Barcelona.”
Asked by Motorsport.com to expand on the difference between the car on track and his feeling in the simulator, Russell said: “It was very much in line with what we saw simulator, and I will be going back and correlating this afternoon.
“But it’s going to be a constant learning process. I think we’re all going to take today with a pinch of salt and just get through the programme, making sure the car runs OK, the drivers are comfortable, and we’re in the best spot possible ahead of Barcelona.”
Russell will embark on his first full season with Mercedes in 2022, having first joined its junior programme back in 2017 when he was racing in Formula 3.
The Briton has spent the last three years racing for Williams, but has remained a recurring fixture in Mercedes F1 machinery, including a one-off appearance at the 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix when Hamilton was ruled out with COVID-19.
Although Russell has driven a Mercedes F1 car every year since 2017, he admitted to a special feeling when he took the W13 out for its first run today.
“It gave me goosebumps when the car was fired up for the first time,” Russell said.
“I’ve driven it so often, so many laps in the simulator. I’ve seen so many drawings of it. I’ve had so many meetings about it, but there’s nothing like going to a racetrack.
“It almost brings me back to my roots, you know, a cold, wet windy day at Silverstone – but here with the Mercedes F1 team.”
Source: Motorsport.com