Mercedes has a certainty and a doubt. The doubt, of course, has nothing to do with whether or not Lewis Hamilton will be at the wheel of the W13 , given that the seven-time champion, despite the “wall of silence” he erected after losing the title at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, will be in your seat when the engines start.
The certainty is related to the new power unit that will be homologated before the first round of the 2022 season in Bahrain. The German engine will become the strong point of the W13, the single-seater that will be revealed to the world on February 18 at Silverstone.
Hywel Thomas , engine manager at Brixworth, believes the new power unit should be a leap forward from last year’s unit, the 6-cylinder F1 M12 E Performance . That power unit showed weak spots towards the end of its life, forcing Mercedes engineers to reduce the number of kilometers during the campaign (Lewis Hamilton used five engines in the 2021 season, and Valtteri Bottas up to six, when the limit to avoid an FIA sanction was three).
With a shorter cycle (four instead of eight grands prix), the Brixworth engineers took a gamble on reliability, pushing the engine maps beyond the limits set for the year. This made it possible to squeeze out a power that had always been available, but had not been exploited for fear of failure.
Mercedes W12 engine detail
For this reason, by not suffering premature aging, the engine was able to give its best, reestablishing the unquestionable superiority over Honda. Thanks to this, Lewis Hamilton managed to reach the Abu Dhabi GP level with Max Verstappen, with three consecutive victories in Brazil, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
With the standard configuration, the Mercedes power unit provided 1,026 hp, while the engine of the Brazilian GP, in qualifying, delivered an additional 18 hp, that is, 1,044 hp for an engine map at the limit.
New German turbo specialist
The arrival of a German specialist in Brixworth would have made it possible to develop a new turbocharger capable of enhancing the qualities of the 6-cylinder engine and recharging the hybrid system. This would allow more risky strategies, especially since the Petronas chemists, suppliers of the fuel, would have recovered the 20 CV lost in the first tests carried out on the bench with E10 fuels, as it should have happened with Ferrari and Shell.
James Allison, Technical Director of Mercedes AMG
The W13 should be Mike Elliot ‘s first project, but in reality, the technical director is mentored by James Allison , who is also involved in the design of the INEOS America’s Cup sailing boat. However, from Mercedes they assure that he is fully involved in the car that will premiere the new rules of 2022.
The change in regulations forced the car to be designed from scratch, so it has few similarities with the W12. The Brackley team, at the beginning of last summer, transferred all the technical staff to the car for this course, and stopped the development of the single-seater that was contesting the world championship for drivers and constructors.
Sketch of the Mercedes single-seater for 2022
FIA rules mandate a wheelbase of between 3,400 and 3,600 millimetres, while the maximum wheelbase is around 17cm shorter than the 2021 car. But one of the challenges of ground effect cars will be finding the correct distance between the wheels.
The shorter wheelbase helps the car to be agile in the corners, and helps to reach the minimum weight of 793 kg (43 kg more than last year), with a little ballast, although there is no doubt that it is given up to part of the surface of the Venturi tubes and, therefore, is paid for in terms of downforce.
The most complex thing for Mercedes will be to find the ideal balance, and the feeling is that the German single-seater will tend towards the maximum values of the wheelbase. German engineers will rely on rear-wheel steering simulations to make the W13 unbeatable when attacking curbs, but we’ll have to wait until the Barcelona tests on February 23-25 to find out where each is. set.
