The Red Bull RB18, which won the 2022 F1 Constructors’ and Drivers’ Championships, was powered to its dominant success by a Red Bull Powertrains (RBPT) RBPTH001. This power unit is a derivative of the Honda RA621H, used by the Japanese manufacturer during the 2021 F1 World Championship campaign.
Red Bull Powertrains was created in 2021 to supply power units to Oracle Red Bull Racing and Scuderia AlphaTauri for the 2022 F1 season and beyond, after Honda announced it would exit F1 at the end of the 2021 season. Although Honda’s participation in F1 was officially over, the 2022 Oracle Red Bull Racing and Scuderia AlphaTauri power units were Honda-produced, assembled, maintained, and trackside supported, despite their RBPT designation.
Between 2021 and 2022, there were significant FIA-implemented development restrictions in place for the power unit manufacturers, limiting the spec changes for the 2022 season ahead of an internal combustion engine (ICE), MGU-H, turbocharger, fuel and oil freeze from 1 March 2022, and the MGU-K, energy store and control electronics freeze from 1 September.
After these dates, power unit specifications were frozen until the end of the 2025 season, before a new power unit era starts in 2026.
Detail in design
Despite the limited development scope, Honda engineers in Japan were busy making detailed but essential design changes to the RA621H to produce its successor’s specifications. Without Honda’s commitment, Red Bull would have started the new era at a significant disadvantage, as the other manufacturers developed their power units before those freeze dates.
Honda developed the 2022 RBPTH001 power unit at its research and
