Aston Martin: Adrian Newey says Honda engines pose a risk of nerve damage to drivers

“Mirrors falling off, taillights falling off — all those things we have to address.

“But the most important problem is that the vibration is eventually transmitted to the driver’s fingers.

“So Fernando [Alonso] He feels he can’t do more than 25 laps in a row before he risks permanently damaging the nerves in his hands.

“bayonet [Stroll] He sees that he cannot do more than 15 laps before this limit.”

The team worked to find ways to prevent vibrations from the engine that lead to battery failure in the engine’s hybrid system, which happened to them during pre-season testing.

The car was presented for the Australian Grand Prix.

Honda F1 boss Koji Watanabe said they would only know if the countermeasures were effective when the car started on track on Friday.

The fix provided only stops the vibrations reaching the battery. They are still transferred to the chassis and from there to the handlebars.

“There is no point in not being open and honest in this meeting about our expectations,” Newey said.

“We will have to be very restrictive about the number of laps we do in the race until we get to the top of the vibration source and optimize the vibration at the source.”

Alonso said the vibrations made his hands and feet feel “numb” after a number of laps, but added: “If we were fighting for the win, we could stay for three hours in the car, let’s be clear. But certainly this is something unusual. It shouldn’t be there.”

“We also don’t know the consequences if we continue driving like this for several months. So the solution must be implemented.”

Alonso said the team would decide after qualifying how to approach the race when they had a better understanding of how changes to the car would affect the problem.

Honda’s engine performance has also declined significantly as Formula One begins a new engine regulation period based on a 50-50 split between the internal combustion (ICE) and electric parts of the hybrid engine.

Watanabe declined to comment on information obtained by BBC Sport from informed sources that the electrical part of the engine suffers a power outage of 50 kilowatts (67 hp). The electric motor is limited to 350 kW by regulations.

But Watanabe said the reliability problems it encountered meant Honda was unable to run the power unit at maximum revs.

“One of the problems with these regulations is that the shorter your ICE power usage is, the more you have to compensate by using electric power to cover that lack of ICE power, which means that by the time you really want that electric power on the straights, your battery is dead,” Newey said. “And it becomes a self-fulfilling downward spiral.”

“The direct calculation of what ICE power means in cycle time is compounded by the effect of the lack of electrical power.

“Do I believe in our partners and Honda’s ability to bring that power and competitiveness? Absolutely. They have a proven track record, and we have full faith.”

Watanabe did not answer a question about how Honda could be in this position despite having been in Formula One for more than 10 years. Newcomers Audi and Red Bull Ford were able to produce more efficient engines.

Newey said the car was also behind where he wanted it to be as a result of a “very intense development period”.

Newey started working at Aston Martin in March last year and changed the design philosophy of the car the team had created up to that point. They also couldn’t run a model in their new wind tunnel until mid-April.

This left Aston Martin at least four months behind its rivals in terms of aerodynamic development.

In terms of chassis performance, Aston Martin was “a little bit behind the leaders – probably the fifth best team”, Newey said.

He said the performance gap between the Aston Martin chassis and the best was “about three-quarters of a second – maybe a second”.

He added: “The car has huge, huge development potential. It will, of course, take a few races until we fully realize this potential.

“I don’t see any reason inherent in the architecture of the car why we can’t, chassis-wise, be close to competitive if not completely competitive.”