Mercedes Rear Wing and passive F-Duct deemed legal The FIA has confirmed that a radical wing concept the Mercedes team has pioneered is fully legal.
FIA's F1 technical department Charlie Whiting told Autosport: "Some teams are questioning it on the basis that they thought F-ducts were banned. Well, F-ducts are not banned.
"At the end of 2010 everyone was using driver operated F-ducts and the regulations that were changed specifically banned the use of driver movement to influence the aerodynamic performance of the car – that got rid of that generation of so-called F-ducts.
"At the beginning of last year, with engineers being unable to unlearn things, they wanted to try and get the effect via different means, and they talked about opening and closing a duct by having interaction with the suspension. We said no, you cannot do that because that is not the primary purpose of the suspension system – which is to insulate the car from undulations in the road.
"There was then a lengthy discussion in the TWG at the beginning of last year about that, to make sure everyone was clear about it. It seems a couple of teams went away from that meeting with the impression that F-ducts were banned in general. Whatever an F-duct is. But they are not."
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