Tech analysis: Honda RA106

Now under full Honda ownership, the team formerly known as BAR are entering their seventh year in Formula One. Yet while the team attained a strong finish to the 2004 season, they struggled in 2005 and courted controversy from technical infringements along the way.

This year's car, labelled the RA106, has adopted substantially different aerodynamic solutions - including a "zero keel" front end and super-slim sidepods, mated to the all-new V8 engine and a revised carbon fibre gearbox.

Honda's involvement

This year, the Honda ownership has increased but their development projects on areas beyond the engine have been already running for four years. Consequently, the change of ownership is not expected to create a step change in the pace of the team's development. According to team chief Nick Fry, "the change from no Honda ownership to 45% was greater than the extra 55%."

Around 30 Honda staff members are based at their UK factory with much larger numbers in Japan at the Honda R&D centre in Tochigi. Projects between the UK base at Brackley and Tochigi include the gearbox internals, electronics and materials. Fry added: "we probably run at least thirty collaborative projects at any one time, and that won't change in the future."

Meanwhile, the major UK-based project is the second wind tunnel within the ground of the existing factory. Technical director Geoffrey Willis confirms the project is "getting into the final stage" and will be ready "by the middle of the year."

Development

Last year's car suffered from inconsistent handling stemming largely from the aerodynamics. "We understand the problem from last year," says Willis. "As we went through the year, we found we were getting better at understanding and being able to correlate what we saw on the track and what we saw in the wind tunnel."

This knowledge, along with a thoughtful comparison of the better points of the 006 (2004) and 007 (2005) cars, lead the team to assess what was needed to go into the new car.

Honda preferred to run an interim car in testing, as they have done in recent years. The so-called concept car used a modified 006 chassis with the new engine, gearbox and rear suspension.

Having run this car since last December, the core mechanical components of the car are already proven with 11,000kms of running prior to the roll-out of the new car. As a result, Willis points out, "reliability shouldn't be anything to surprise us."

Moreover, the late delivery of the new car allows more time for aerodynamic and suspension development - the latter being shaped by Michelin's experience in the early V8 tests.

In detail

The new car is a major step in the packaging of the front suspension and sidepods. Starting out with the car's layout, although Willis was not specific, the wheelbase remains similar to last year. This has been accommodated by a longer gearbox, which is mated to the V8 engine unit being shorter by 90mm to its V10 predecessor. Fuel capacity has been stated as 150 litres in the public statements, but this must be taken as only an approximate figure.

It has been the front of the car that Honda have focused on, to start the improvement in the aerodynamics. "It looks quite different," Willis said at Barcelona. "We changed it for a number of reasons; both structural and for suspension, as well as aerodynamic reasons."

By adopting a "no keel" design, the front of the car is much cleaner, but Honda have found their own interpretation of the layout, which has been so talked about this year.

Unlike other Keel-less designs, the lower wishbone on the RA106 mounts closer to the car's centreline. This aids the suspension's geometry as the upper and lower wishbones are of unequal lengths. In this respect, the wishbone geometry is nearer to a single keel, albeit with the keel shortened down to almost zero.

Additionally, Honda have chosen to keep their steering rack in a similar position to last year. The steering arms are placed mid-way between each wishbone, and although this layout may be seen as aerodynamically cluttering, Honda have seen some advantages in the design.

Another compromise in the "no keel" design is how to mount the pushrod at a sufficiently steep angle. Honda moved the rocker inside the nose of the chassis upwards, necessitating two small bulges on the top of the monocoque to clear it.

Although not a definitive set-up, the bargeboards appear similar to the 2005 car, but lead back to heavily revised sidepod fronts. At floor level, the "axe heads" are now much larger. These help prevent air flowing back under the floor to the benefit of rear downforce.

Above the sidepod fronts are revised shoulder wings. In fact, the launch version of the RA106 did not feature a distinct wing profile at all, and the device is now largely a vertical fin, with the lower mount routing the airflow downwards towards the larger sidepod flip-up.

In keeping with the fashion this year, the sidepods are undercut at the front and slimmed significantly at the rear. The difference in the sidepods to last year's car is striking, as the team have dropped the old cooling format for more conventional chimneys and two louvers.

The visual impact of this is to enforce how slim the rear of the car is, aided by the faired-in exhausts protruding from the sloping rear of the sidepods. With the team's aim to keep aerodynamic drag to a minimum in respect to the lower power of the engine, the sidepods' flip ups are now much flatter, without a wing profile at their trailing edge.

Carried over from the 007 car is the rear wing, mounted via a pair of struts and endplates with four slots. As a result of the more stringent rear impact tests, the tail unit is much larger and imposes more into the diffuser. Again, the diffuser appears carried over from the 007 car with changes planned for Bahrain.

Under the skin, the teams carbon fibre cased gearbox is in its third generation, with the Honda developed gearshift system providing fast but, more importantly, smooth gear changes to aid the car's stability through a corner.

Hondas V8

Ending last year with an aggressive development programme on the V10, it is generally accepted the Honda engine was perhaps the most powerful engine of the 3.0-litre era. As president of Honda Racing Development Yasuhiro Wada commented, the V10 was "not quite close to 1000bhp" but did nearer to 965bhp.

While the rate of the development of the V10 pushed on, the first development on the V8 was run in parallel. The V8 first ran at Mugello back in May 2005, well ahead of the rest of the field.

When installed to the concept car for winter testing, the Honda 2.4l V8 has received praised for its reliability as well as power - with one leading driver commenting that the Honda engine was now the most powerful of the field.

As with all teams developing the engine around the new rules, Honda have had to cope with the barring of certain materials within the engine. "Last year we enjoyed some specific materials," Wada commented, "but the regulations are the same for everybody, we just do our best."

Also, the banning of variable inlet trumpets has affected the engine's power delivery, and Wada says the smaller engines are "naturally more peaky," adding that "drivability is a big challenge."

As the engines are peakier, the Honda-developed engine needs to work with the rest of the drive train (gearbox, differential and their controls systems). "Last year we worked really closely together at Brackley on the gearbox and the controls," Wada adds. "Now, with less power, the control systems are even more crucial. So were really working closely together."

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- The Autosport.com Team

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