Honda's Yasuhisa Arai says he wants to see a change in the regulations that would allow the struggling engine constructor make up ground on its main rivals.

The firm's much publicised struggles on its return to Formula 1 in collaboration with McLaren showed little sign of abating in Singapore, with Jenson Button and Fernando Alonso suffering more reliability problems.

With Honda accepting it would have benefitted from a longer lead-in time of development, the firm is now putting faith in a potential relaxing of the regulations that it believes would allow it to make quicker strides in catching Mercedes and Ferrari.

"I think the current regulation is so restricted for the engine manufacturers," he said. "At Honda we are in a new phase and one year behind and it's very difficult to catch up the top teams. So I hope personally that the regulation is more relaxed which would be very useful to help catch up."

It is a view shared by Red Bull Racing's Christian Horner, who is concerned F1 is descending into a head-to-head between Mercedes and Ferrari as engine constructors'

"I think it is important for Formula 1 to have competitive engine manufacturers because what we are rapidly descending upon is two dominant engine suppliers and that ultimately isn't healthy for Formula 1.

"With the V8 you had three or four competitive engines that were capable of winning. Now you have only got two engines that are capable of winning races on merit and that is not particularly healthy."