Yes matey. Under the current regulations in Formula One, manufacturers must supply customer teams with power units that are identical in specification and performance to those used by their own works team.
This requirement comes from the FIA Sporting Regulations. Article 8.3 states that a power unit manufacturer must provide customer teams with power units of the same specification as those used by the works team. In other words, Merc cannot legally give its own works team a better or newer engine than the ones supplied to customer teams such as McLaren etc.
The FIA enforces this through several mechanisms. First, the power unit design must be homologated with the governing body, the FIA. Once homologated, the specification of the engine hardware is effectively frozen. They can make changes can only be made for reliability, safety or cost reasons, and any approved change must be supplied to all teams using that engine.
Second, each engine component is registered, serialised and sealed by the FIA. The internal combustion engine, turbocharger, MGU, energy store, control electronics and other components all carry identification numbers and FIA seals. If a sealed component is opened or modified without FIA approval it becomes illegal and they get penalised.
Third, all teams run a standardised ECU supplied by McLaren Applied Technologies. The FIA has full access to the engine software and telemetry. They can monitor torque demand, ignition timing, fuel flow, ERS deployment and other parameters in real time. This prevents a manufacturer from secretly giving its works team a more aggressive engine map.
Engine mode restrictions also play a role. Since the 2020 season the FIA requires a single internal combustion engine mode to be used from qualifying through the race.
In practice this means the physical engine and its allowed operating modes must be the same across all teams using that manufacturer.
It used to be the case that customer engines weren’t as good but that all changed in 2018 with technical directive TD/005-18 but it goes on for ages so I’ll let you google it if you’re interested.
Works teams can still gain an advantage through better cooling, packaging or integration of the power unit within their chassis. However, the regulations are designed so that the actual power unit specification and performance must be identical between works and customer teams.
https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/1...on-being-provided-by-engine-supplier-mercedes
McClaren and Williams not happy.
And then there is this:
https://www.marca.com/motor/formula...-use-nuevo-aduo-salvo-aston-martin-honda.html
If you can't translate it then I'll break it down.
Mercedes won't let anyone use the new ADUO except Aston Martin-Honda
The opinion in the paddock is that they will regulate to win by the minimum so that the competition does not apply the AI support program
In just five days the cars will be rolling in Shanghai for the second round of the 2026 season and for the first with Sprint, a challenge that is like climbing Everest for some like Aston Martin, but that will be a test to see if Mercedes continues with the same dominance in a completely different circuit.
In China there are much longer charging areas and where the delivery of its electric power will be much easier than in Australia and you will need to lift your foot from the accelerator less before each braking than in Melbourne.
If in 2025 the gasoline flow was measured with amount of flow that could not exceed 100 kg / h, in 2026 the measurement takes into account energy that that gasoline generates, being an ecofuel that can arrive from different sources and always without any fossil raw material.
Enrico Gualtieri, Ferrari’s head of engines, explained it. "There is a sensor that measures the energy flow, and before going out to the track each manufacturer will have to measure their fuel by a third body, which will have to declare how much the energy content is per unit mass of its gasoline, and then assign a value, which will be different for each supplier," he explained.
The Mercedes is Petronas for all its engines, its own partner in the equipment and its fuel is synthetic, while Shell (Ferrari) comes from biomass. They can control what they have and what their engines spend and McLaren, Williams and Alpine, which must be the same, but the Mercedes chassis is much lighter and more efficient and takes more performance out of it, at least at this start.
What all this mean?
Because Mercedes can control that fuel flow on each circuit and what’s best for its W17, as it progresses over the weekend. Until Friday’s FP3 they didn’t even appear in Australia and in qualifying they put 0.8 (from Russell to Leclerc) to Ferrari.
In the race they pressed when it was their turn at the beginning, to hunt down Leclerc after his stratospheric start and then, when Ferrari failed in the strategy (or simply wanted to continue with his plan because they knew that they could not go for the victory), both Russell and Antonelli could reach lap 58 with very used hard tyres, without suffering anything. That shows that the advantage they treasure is much greater than it seems. Their compression ratio of 18:1 (for the 16:1 of the rest) also gives them a lower consumption of gasoline. It is a chain that adds advantages and efficiency, rather than pure power. At the lowest weight, less tire degradation and addition and follow.
What is the ADUO?
The FIA explains that it is this word in its regulation 2026. “It’s the ADUO concept (translated is Additional Development and Improvement Opportunities), which aims to provide greater development opportunities to power unit manufacturers that are significantly below the competition in terms of performance. Performance will be continuously measured between all power units, and after races 6, 12 and 18, ADUO could be assigned to address this situation, providing."
If someone is between 2% and 4% below the performance of the best, in this case Mercedes, could introduce an improvement from race 7, the Canadian GP, if the difference is above the 4% disadvantage, it will be able to apply two improvements.
And that’s what Mercedes is going to try, that their rivals, except Aston Martin and Honda, who are in another film, can’t apply engine upgrades and win by the minimum while they can, less than that 2% if they can.