Mercedes and Ferrari aim to refine F-ducts for the Spanish Grand Prix. Mercedes initiate an first "inactive" version of the drag-reducing mechanism in China, as efforts to fully imitate McLaren's innovative system keep on at the factory. Unlike McLaren's system, Mercedes' Shanghai F-duct was not operated by the driver, with air instead being cleverly flicked at more and more higher speeds through a slot in the rear wing.
We're still working on the proper system which we're having in Barcelona or Istanbul, there's no point in having it in Monaco, said team principal Ross Brawn. "It is complicated to get to work properly.
It is a alike story at Ferrari, where only some parts of a full F-duct system emerged on the F10 car in china.
We are working on the F-duct and more progress could be made for Barcelona, although that's not confirmed yet," Fernando Alonso told Spain's Marca. "It is not an easy system, but I know the team is working hard to make it available as soon as possible.
For the meantime, Germany's Auto Motor und Sport reports that a further development of Sauber's China-specification F-duct will be debuted on the C29 in Spain next weekend. Williams also had problems with its initial F-duct in Shanghai, and technical director Sam Michael is not expecting a quick fix.
"I expect it will take us a couple of months to get it working properly," Schumi said.
