McLaren have fallen to the back of the top four teams in recent races as rivals have introduced upgrades, but the hope is that the aerodynamic package to be brought in across the Hungarian and Dutch Grands Prix on either side of Formula 1’s summer break will return them to competitiveness.
They decided that it was better to take the grid penalty in Belgium, where they expect to be no more competitive than at the last race in Britain but where passing is relatively straightforward, than compromise Hungary, where the car should perform better and overtaking is notoriously difficult.
Norris’ grid penalty comes after a troubled start to the season for the team that won a drivers’ and constructors’ championship double last year, in both performance and reliability terms.
Technically, the part replaced in Belgium is known as the ‘power electronics’, which is a control computer within the battery module.
Norris failed to start the Chinese Grand Prix in March after a terminal issue with his power electronics unit, and a second example of that part had to be withdrawn after suffering problems in practice at the following race in Japan.
The Japan unit was repaired but suffered a terminal problem in practice in Monaco.
A McLaren statement said: “While the power electronics unit we installed in Japan, and have used in every session since Miami, has worked reliably, Mercedes-AMG High Performance Powertrains (HPP) has since introduced a series of reliability fixes to their new power electronics systems.
“However, in order to take advantage of these improvements, we must incur a 10-place grid penalty on Lando’s car in order to take a new unit.”
The statement added: “We now plan to use this fourth power electronics unit for the remainder of the season, in order to maximise reliability while minimising sporting penalties on Lando.”
McLaren will have a new rear wing design in Spa, which the team hopes will better suit the specific characteristics of the flowing high-speed track around the Ardennes forests.
This wing will have a conventional opening style in straight-line mode, rather than the somersaulting designs introduced this season by Ferrari and Red Bull.
Red Bull have had to revert to a conventional wing this weekend after Max Verstappen suffered high-speed crashes at the previous two races because of issues with the design.
Mercedes have had a series of engine-related reliability issues this year, not all to do with the battery.
Another has emerged with the engine used by championship leader Kimi Antonelli at the British Grand Prix.
That has had to go back to the HPP’s base in Brixworth for investigation and the Italian has a new engine as a result this weekend in Belgium. This is from within his allocation and therefore comes with no penalty.
Depending on the outcome of the investigations, Mercedes hope to be able to put Antonelli’s Silverstone unit back into the pool for use later in the year.
