Misery for McLaren and Honda continues in Barcelona, during the second and final Formula 1 pre-season test at Circuit de Catalunya, as they were forced to change the power unit on Stoffel Vandoorne's MCL32 during the course of the morning.
An electrical problem was blamed for what is now reportedly the sixth engine change the team have been forced to make in testing this winter.
It is the latest in a series of ongoing issues with Honda's all new power unit package which will mean that McLaren start the new season on the back foot for the third year in a row.
Vandoorne ended the morning eighth fastest, 2.972 seconds off the pace.
A Honda spokes person said: "In the interests of maximising lap time, we sped to replace the power-unit and investigate the issue further once it is out of the car. The PU we are using is the same specification as the one run at the test last week."
When interviewed by the BBC in the Barcelona after the latest setback, McLaren sporting director Eric Boullier said, “Not very much concerned yet, I would say. Obviously we got hurt in our job to understand the car, develop the car, validate some parts."
"But the process today is more about generating data as much as we can. And feed the machine back in Woking and make sure the correlation is working with CFD or wind tunnel or anything else because everything else is based on our simulation."
"So on this part obviously we would like more laps because we want to test more parts, but the few we have done were good. The correlation was good, so we can now build on predictions. This part is okay, so not concerned yet."
"For the rest, obviously I leave the decisions in the hands of Honda to make sure they investigate properly, they address it properly, and we have to rely on our partner that they will do it, and we believe that they will do it." added Boulier.
Tale of McLaren's engine woes in Barcelona:
Day 1: McLaren start testing an all new Honda power unit package, but an oil-tank problem arises and an engine change is called for. The replacement engine runs until the end of the day before it is changed again overnight.
Day 2: A failure in the morning results in a third engine change which runs to the end of the day. Not clear if there was an engine change overnight.
Day 3: Engine runs reliably throughout the day, but is well off the pace setters. The PU is changed overnight.
Day4: Engine that starts the day runs reliably, but again well off the pace.
Day 5: Honda claim the engine they had bolted on for the first day of the second test had already been run but before lunch an electrical problems forces another change.
BBC report fro the paddock that "Honda are being very cagey about how many engines have been used in total - they say they don’t disclose the number of engines used in testing."
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