HONDA RA107

   The successful 2006 season brings a good dose of optimism to Brackley, a town in Northamptonshire, England, and home of the Honda Racing F1 Team. Unfortunately for the Japanese team, the new 2007 Honda RA107 single-seater goes down in history more for its iconic livery than for its results. The “livery launch” of the RA107 takes place at the Natural History Museum in London on February 26, 2007, and presents a completely new interpretation of the appearance of a Formula 1 car. The 2007 Honda livery does not feature sponsorship branding; instead, it focuses on the company’s environmental commitment, aiming to raise awareness of environmental issues and climate change. The car is nicknamed by the British specialist press the “Honda Earth Car,” and its livery depicts planet Earth against the black background of space, with only two logos present on the car: Honda’s “H” and the Bridgestone logo, both placed at the front. On the rear wing, the web address of the environmental awareness website “My Earth Dream” is displayed. It is the first time in 30 years that a Grand Prix car appears on the grid completely without sponsors, and at the end of the season Honda receives a special award for the “Earth Car” campaign.

HONDA RA107, Jenson Button
Hungaroring, Hungarian GP 2007

   Beneath the “space-themed” livery, the RA107 hides a project that proves extremely difficult to set up, suffering from serious aerodynamic balance issues. The design of the new RA107 is developed by Senior Technical Director Shūhei Nakamoto, a Honda engineer who until the early 2000s worked in Honda’s motorcycle division, together with Deputy Technical Director Gary Savage. The rest of the technical staff is virtually unchanged from 2006, with Kevin Taylor (Chief Designer), Mariano Alperin (Head of Aerodynamics), joined during the season by veteran aerodynamicist Loïc Bigois, as well as Kazuo Sakurahara (Engine Project Leader) responsible for engine development. The race drivers are Briton Jenson Button and Brazilian Rubens Barrichello, both confirmed from the previous season, while the reserve and test drivers are Austrian Christian Klien and Briton Mike Conway. Despite the enormous resources of the Japanese giant, the car is a technical failure that relegates the team to the back of the grid.

HONDA RA107, Jenson Button
Monza, Italian GP 2007

   The new chassis is made of carbon composite, but with a weight distribution that does not suit the new Bridgestone tyres. The new suspension adopts a push-rod layout on both axles, but the system’s kinematics fail to compensate for the loss of aerodynamic downforce in slow corners, causing chronic understeer. The new Honda RA807E engine is probably the only positive note of the new car: sufficiently powerful (around 780 hp at 19,000 rpm) and, above all, very reliable. The Japanese V8 sacrifices some peak power, but compared to the competition it offers a much more linear power delivery, with excellent response from low to mid revs; however, this is not enough to compensate for the shortcomings of the chassis and the poor aerodynamics of the RA107.

HONDA RA107, Rubens Barrichello
Interlagos, Brazilian GP 2007

   The main problem of the RA107 is the lack of correlation between the wind tunnel and the track. Data that appear excellent at the factory too often translate into a dynamic nightmare for the drivers once applied to the car. The vehicle suffers from an aerodynamic center of pressure that shifts unpredictably during braking and turn-in, making the car particularly nervous and undermining driver confidence. In an attempt to generate the necessary downforce not produced by the bodywork, the team is forced to increase wing angles, resulting in a car that is extremely slow on the straights, often the slowest of the field in top speed. The oversized cooling system for the engine does not help: while it improves the durability and reliability of the V8, it also increases the car’s frontal area, further worsening aerodynamic drag. The sidepods are therefore quite bulky and less tapered than those of the competition (Ferrari and McLaren above all). This negatively affects the airflow directed toward the rear diffuser, reducing the effectiveness of the flat floor that should generate downforce. The most humiliating technical aspect for Honda in 2007 is the comparison with its satellite team, Super Aguri, which uses a car directly based on the previous 2006 Honda RA106. In many races in the first half of the season, Super Aguri is clearly faster than the RA107, proving that the project is fundamentally flawed. The failure of the RA107 is so embarrassing that Honda decides to almost immediately abandon development of the car during 2007 and to hire Ross Brawn (former Ferrari Technical Director) to rebuild the entire technical department from scratch.

HONDA RA107, Jenson Button
Spa-Francorchamps, Belgian GP 2007

   Already during pre-season testing, the technical shortcomings of the new Honda car become evident, but with the start of the season the situation becomes downright embarrassing, with both RA107s consistently at the back of the pack and far from the performance of the leaders. On the rare occasions when the two drivers fight for top positions, strategy errors from the pit wall knock them out of the points, as in the Monaco and Canadian Grands Prix, when in the final laps both RA107s are forced to make an extra pit stop to finish the race. Only the good reliability of the mechanical components and the Honda V8 slightly salvages an otherwise disastrous season, allowing Button and Barrichello to consistently see the chequered flag. The first point of the season, however, arrives only in July at the French Grand Prix, the eighth round of the championship, thanks to Button’s hard-fought eighth place. The same result is repeated five races later in Italy at Monza, while in China, the penultimate race of the championship, the best result of the season is achieved, with a fifth place once again taken by Button. At the end of the season, the six points scored certainly cannot satisfy Honda management, especially since only the two new teams on the grid, Super Aguri and Spyker, finish behind them.