Honda will look to see if Max Verstappen’s engine can be salvaged following his big crash at the British Grand Prix.
The Red Bull driver hit the tyre barrier with an impact of 51G after been tagged by Lewis Hamilton on the entry to Copse on Lap 1, resulting in significant damage.
And with drivers limited to just three of the major power unit components and two of others for all 23 races, losing an engine this early in the season would likely mean grid penalties later on in 2021.
“When I first saw the images of the car being lifted, I thought there was a lot of damage,” said Honda F1 technical chief Toyoharu Tanabe.
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“But in reality, it seems that the damage is less than what we first saw. However, the actual damage cannot be known from its appearance when it is installed in the car.
“So we would like to send it back to HRD in Sakura and check it before making a decision.”
Currently, Verstappen does still have one entirely new power unit he can take without penalty, but anything that can be used again would certainly be very useful for the rest of the year.
Another fallout from the controversial incident is cost, with teams limited to a cap of $145m which they are having to divide between their 2021 and 2022 development programs.
Earlier this year, Mercedes put a price tag of $1m on the damage done to Valtteri Bottas’ car in his high-speed crash with George Russell at Imola.
And now Red Bull’s Helmut Marko has offered an early estimate on how much this accident will hurt the budget.
“As things stand, it is about 750k Euros,” he claimed. “Although the engine situation is not quite clear yet.”