Buying a racing engine from your competitor must be so embarassing for...

[LorenzoBandini]

...Honda.

They needed a company owned by the parent of Mitsubishi Motors to race in the IRL.

How embarassing!

Funny how no one ever calls THAT engine the Honda Illmor or the Honda-Chrysler or the Honda-bushi.

[cmjc80]

Just the typical double-standard of the automotive world. Nothing new.

[vegasduo]

Re: Buying a racing engine from your competitor must be so embarassing for...

Originally posted by LorenzoBandini
...Honda.

They needed a company owned by the parent of Mitsubishi Motors to race in the IRL.

How embarassing!

Funny how no one ever calls THAT engine the Honda Illmor or the Honda-Chrysler or the Honda-bushi.

The first real success for Infiniti was when they dumped their in house efforts and bought an engine from TWR. I don't remember any big deal being made about that at the time. I was glad to see them do it since it made for better, more competitive, racing.

The introduction of the new Chevy was one aspect of the IndyCar race at MIS which caused it to be even more exciting for me and I'm sure for others also. We already knew it had plenty of power but the high drama was created by the unknown durability of the engine.

[nascarnation]

I'm definitely a GM partisan but there is inbreeding everywhere.
GM is using the Honda V6 in the Saturn Vue in 2004, has built cars & trucks with Toyota in Fremont Calif for 20 yrs, and GM Powertrain is designing the new 6 speed fwd auto trans for Ford cars. Nobody is big enough to be the best in everything these days, with the markets so segmented there is need for sharing to get economy of scale.

[JoeBob]

Not to mention that GM's engines in CART were Illmors, and the first GM IRL engine was a TWR, and of course TWR later went on provide Infiniti's IRL engines as well.

[indyracer56]

Actually, some of the first GM engines in Cart were the turbo Buicks, and there were also turbo V6 Chevys and a N/A Pontiac, if I remember right.

[PHJIndy]

Cross pollination's been going on for years!

[StatMan]

I say we name the engines as follows:

Ford Cosworth Chevrolet Generation Four Motor

Honda Ilmor Mercedes Chrysler IndyCar Engine

[Railbird]

I've made comments on the Honda/Ilmor all year if for no other reason than the Ilmor should be this year's Chevy.

Dumb move on GM's part.

The problem lies with with a current competitor getting to introduce a whole new engine mid season.

Had Honda built a dog and then lobbied to replace it with something Ilmor had laying on the shelf I believe the Track Forum opinions would not be so amiable toward the change.

Unless of course Sam had been saddled with the dog.

but that's just my opinion

and I've been told that I occasionaly abandon all logic

[gpaje]

I have been so disappointed in Honda regarding their Ilmor designed motor.

For their whole rich racing history, Honda has never relied on another partner to build their racing engines.

If Honda wasn't 9-10 months behind Toyota in terms of committing to the IRL, then Honda would have built their own motor, even against HPD's wishes.

I just hope Honda doesn’t tarnish their racing heritage by continuing in this fashion, and have a complete HPD designed & built motor soon!!!

[indyXcore]

Originally posted by StatMan
I say we name the engines as follows:

Ford Cosworth Chevrolet Generation Four Motor

Honda Ilmor Mercedes Chrysler IndyCar Engine

or the Chevrolet Presents the Generation IV Indycar V8 Powered by Ford-Cosworth.

Man, that's a mouthful.

[TxIndyFan]

The problem lies with with a current competitor getting to introduce a whole new engine mid season

Hey 'bird, didn't Nissan ddo the same thing with the 35A? They introduced that engine mid-season, didn't they?