Wolff: FIA should have acted without delay on 'flexi floors'

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff says the FIA should have  enforced a Technical Directive on F1's flexi-floors as soon as the ploy was discovered.

On the back of two Technical Directives released in Montreal and at Silverstone, the governing body had planned to introduce at this weekend's French GP an Aerodynamic Oscillation Metric (AOM) devised to force teams to limit the bouncing and bottoming of their cars.

A clampdown on the flexibility of the cars' floors was also planned, but the stringent monitoring and restrictions were delayed until after F1's summer break following a meeting in Austria of the Formula 1 Commission.

The FIA's measures regarding porpoising and flexi floors are now set to be introduced at next month's Belgian Grand Prix.

The flexi floor intrigue involves an interpretation of a grey area of the rules by which some teams appear to have incorporated into a floor's plank and skid blocks a hidden degree of flexing that does not comply with the rules.

This allows a car to be run closer to the ground - with a performance benefit - without the plank's thickness being worn beyond its regulatory limit.

The FIA reportedly identified the potential ploy, which many believe is being cleverly exploited by Red Bull and Ferrari, while investigation F1's porpoising issues, a problem that has mainly impacted Mercedes.

The governing body has incorporated into its TD's new floor requirements that will come into force at Spa.

• Read also: Horner says it's too late to change 2023 floor rules

"There was a regulatory change or like a technical directive to make clear what the FIA wishes to not see any more at Spa and is particular on the skids," Wolff explained to Sky Sports at Paul Ricard.

"And then for next year, they’re talking about what can be done in in order to remove some of the questions around the floor or the plank, having a little bit of compliance. So yeah, it’s still up in the air."

But Wolff, who equates the flexi floor ploy to "more than a loophole" in the regs says the FIA should have acted immediately.

"I think it was a coincidence that the FIA spotted it in one of the races, and made it very clear that this was not on," he said.

"First of all, there is no such thing as a magic bullet, unless you speak of a double diffuser, so that's not going to make a big difference.

"They [Red Bull] will probably only need to run the car a little bit higher on the front on the bib [of the floor] than they used to be.

"I think this TD should have been brought into place once it was discovered three races ago, so the argument of 'Is it fair to have brought it into the middle of the season?' is the wrong one.

"It should have been introduced when it was discovered, because it's clearly much more than a loophole."

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