As car launches and testing fast approach ahead of Formula 1's first race of the season in March, Mike Elliott of Mercedes discusses the vast array of changes to the cars imposed by the new regulations. 

"This year's cars are going to be hugely different," Elliott explained. "I think the most visible difference will be in the aerodynamic shape of the car. Not only are the aerodynamics different, but the whole way the regulations are constructed is completely different." 

The new approach to these regulations aims to tighten up the field by limiting design freedom. Elliott continued to highlight the differences and how they affect the team. 

"In the past we've just had to fill boxes, or shadow certain planes, but in this set of regulations we're given a sort of base surface that we have got to work to and we have got to stick within a certain tolerance of it. So that's a completely different way of working for us.

"The power unit for this year is very different as well." He continued. "It is going to be fixed until 2025 and it also has to run what's called E10 fuel, so that's 10 percent bioethanol. That makes quite big changes to the power unit. 

"We have 18 inch rims and tyres to go with that, so that's going to be quite a big difference. There's also an increase in mass so I think the cars are going to look very different, they're going to perform quite differently and I think that's going to be interesting to watch."

Elliott went on to discuss how far reaching the impacts of the new regulations are, in effect causing changes to almost all components within the car. 

"With such a significant aerodynamic change, pretty much all the components underneath the skin of the car need to change," he said. "All the way from front to back everything is different. All those new components to design has been a huge challenge.

"The new car looks completely different to last year's and that is just a consequence of the regulations, they're a very much different shape. The complexity we used to have around the bargeboard area is gone, and the differences between the cars are going to be more in the surface shape.

"As a result I think all of this year's cars will look fairly similar. They'll have similar shapes and the differences will all be fairly subtle," he predicted. 

Elliott also said he expects the most dramatic differences to be under the floors of the cars, which will manifest visually in floor shapes. 

"The strakes on the leading edge [of the floor] and the shape and camber of the floor is going to make a big difference and completely affect the way the car works."

One of the biggest visual differences seen in the concept car was the front and rear wings which Elliott describes as "swoopy". He also expresses his taste for the older cars. 

"It's something completely different to what we had last year. For me as an aerodynamicist, i quite liked the old cars and I have not quite got used to these new ones, but it's just different. 

"The overall performance of the new cars is probably not going to be very different from the old. Obviously the intention of these regulations was to try and improve overtaking and it will be a little bit of time before we can see whether that has actually happened."