Honda's Next IndyCar Engine Will Be Something Completely New. Here's How They're Getting Ready

Fu adds that "nothing is ever tabled," leaving the door open for other unexpected Honda and Acura racing endeavors in North America. That could even mean Honda might eventually show up in NASCAR, as it was rumored to do in 2025; it would be a surprise after the recent announcements in IMSA and IndyCar, but it's not necessarily impossible. With eight months left until the 2027 24 Hours of Daytona, there is still time left for a customer IMSA GTP program to come together, too.

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The 2028 IndyCar rule set is not quite finalized, but a few major changes are known. One is the existence of a single-car factory entry spot for each engine-builder, something Honda is expected to exercise with current IMSA partner Meyer Shank Racing. When asked if that program could mirror the partnership HRC US currently has with MSR's No. 93 entry in IMSA, Salters says that the manufacturer still has to "figure out that stuff."

"We've already said that we would like to. What we've learned on car 93, it would be good to take forward. That develops our people, it develops our technology, AI, all that sort of stuff. We've got to figure out how that works because, also, our job is to make sure an 'H' [for Honda] wins. I don't care which one. As long as there's an 'H,' I don't care. It's like here [in IMSA]; as long as there's an Acura winning, I don't care which one.

"We've got to make sure it's fair and equitable to everybody that we develop our people and our tech, we help the good of Honda," Salters goes on. "We have a brilliant relationship with Mike [Shank], but it's got to be fair and equitable to everybody, and it's got to be for the good of the Honda IndyCar effort. Like I said: I don't care who wins, as long as it's got an H on it."

The new engines are expected to be 2.4-liter V-6s, the same displacement currently used in the ARX-06 IMSA racer. While there may be lessons from that engine applied to the new IndyCar motor, Salters stresses that the upcoming engine will be an entirely new design.

"The lovely thing about the new IndyCar is that, it's new. We will have a new engine for 2028, which is why we get up in the morning. We've just about defined the rule set, so the rule set is still being defined; as soon as that's done, it's go time, and we will make a new engine," he says.

"Does it use our learnings from the last 32 years? We will use our learning from 32 years, from 60 years, but it needs some new stuff, so we will learn new stuff. Our engineers, as soon as we get our rule set, they're empowered to put as much cool stuff into an engine as they can. Will it take some learnings from other engines? I assume so—but we'll have new stuff that we've not seen before, I assume, and they are empowered to do that, that's what we want them to do. Go out and do some risky stuff, but manage that risk."

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"We know it will be a 2.4-liter V-6," Salters continues, "but what's in it will be quite different. How it's made will be quite different. Things have moved on a lot, that's the nice thing. We get to make some new stuff. And then we get to improve our machining capabilities—maybe we make it different. What's in it that makes more power. AI is a game changer; what can we do with AI now to help us with design?"

While the hybrid powertrain should open up new levels of control for engineers as it has in sports car racing, Fu cautions that the upcoming rule set is still not likely to be defined by what the hybrid system can do.

"IndyCar is IndyCar," Fu says. "You can't lose the essence of what IndyCar is, right? It's the driver controlling it, without a ton of computer interference, so there's got to be a balance of the rawness of the driver inputs and the lack of track control ... It's not going to become LMDh with an open wheel; it's a balance between the two. It can become the best of both worlds."

Both Fu and Salters stress the need for two kinds of sustainability in the rule set, both ecological and financial. That means figuring out how to make technological advancement work on a budget. "The racing is stellar," Salters says, "let's keep the good racing. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater; let's keep the good racing, but let's find interesting things to work on that we can all afford. If it gets where we can't afford it, I can tell you what's going to happen: It won't end well. So let's be sensible, let's live within our means but do good stuff. There's ways to do that, so there's lots of good discussion."

Those conversations are ongoing, even after both a new chassis from Dallara and the basic framework of a new hybrid 2.4-liter V-6 engine were committed to months ago. Honda, Dallara, IndyCar, and rival engine manufacturer Chevrolet still have nearly two full years before the next generation of cars debuts at the start of the 2028 season.

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