McLaren-Honda says it suspects the water leak which hindered running on the opening day of the first in-season test in Bahrain is linked to the issues which it encountered across the course of the Grand Prix weekend.
Test and development driver Oliver Turvey completed only a couple of installation laps before a water leak from the ERS was detected, meaning the team had to undertake a power unit change, severely limiting its running.
Turvey returned to action during the final hour of the day but finished at the foot of the standings, having completed the least mileage.
“After Oliver completed his installation run this morning, we discovered a water leak in the ERS which required a full power unit change," explained McLaren Racing Director Eric Boullier.
"We suspect the issue is related to those we encountered over the race weekend in Bahrain, but the circumstances were slightly different, so until the Honda engineers have done a full investigation we cannot be sure."
Honda Principal Engineer Satoshi Nakamura added: "We had hoped to work on improving our reliability following the issues we had during the Bahrain Grand Prix.
"However, we still have one more day to go tomorrow. We will be aiming to complete as many laps as possible in order to proceed with our development in both reliability and performance."
Stoffel Vandoorne is scheduled to drive the MCL32 during Wednesday's running.
Discussion about this post