Water leak on ERS slows McLaren in Bahrain

With only 17 laps on the clock in the MCL32 entrusted to Oliver Turvey yesterday in Bahrain, McLaren had a truncated day yesterday during the first driving session of the tests organized on the Sakhir track.

Once again, the Honda Power Unit was to blame for McLaren's problems, with a water leak detected on the ERS of the Honda Power Unit, requiring a complete change of the propulsion unit.

“Today we had hoped to work to improve our reliability following the problems encountered during the Bahrain Grand Prix, underlined Satoshi Nakamura, principal engineer at Honda.

But unfortunately, we faced a water leak issue on the ERS right after completing the installation laps, and which occurred in a similar location compared to last weekend's issues.

It is still being investigated whether this is the same issue as last week, and we are also investigating whether these issues are linked to the specific characteristics of Bahrain, such as the temperature or the layout of the circuit. We are working hard to resolve these issues before the Russian Grand Prix. »

Oliver Turvey finally finished with the last time of the session, for his return to the seat of a McLaren. “This is my eighth season with the team as a test driver, and I last drove for McLaren-Honda in 2015, so the car is completely different, recalls the Briton.

It's difficult to compare from year to year, but all the time and knowledge I can have in the car is important. »