The Williams FW12 was a Formula One racing car used by the Williams team for the season. An updated version, the FW12C, was used for 12 of the 16 races of the season. The FW12 was Williams's first naturally aspirated car since the FW08 and FW08C used in the 1982 and 1983 season. FW12 In its original guise the FW12 featured a Judd CV 3.5 V8. In 1988 the car was unsuccessful for Williams after two years of domination with the FW12's predecessor, the FW11 and FW11B, through use of the all-powerful V6 Honda turbo engine. Williams actually had an existing contract to continue using the Honda engines in 1988. However, the team's refusal to dump Nigel Mansell and replace him with Honda's test driver Satoru Nakajima for the season, as well as Honda being reportedly unhappy with Williams management for allegedly not honouring the number one driver status of Nelson Piquet's contract which contributed to both Piquet and Mansell losing the 1986 Drivers' Championship to McLaren's Alain Prost, saw the relationship between Honda and the team sour and the Japanese giant pulled out of the contract, announcing at the 1987 Hungarian Grand Prix a three-year deal to supply their engines to McLaren from 1988. Early in the season the FW12 was described by both Nigel Mansell and Riccardo Patrese as being pathetically slow in a straight line. The facts backed up the drivers' claims. In qualifying for the opening race of the season in Brazil, despite Mansell qualifying a surprising second on the grid, the FW12 was only timed at on the Jacarepaguá circuits 900 metre long back straight. This compared to the over recorded by McLaren and Lotus with their Honda turbo engines. That speed deficit, along with trouble from the reactive suspension system, saw only one point scored before the mid-season British Grand Prix, when Riccardo Patrese finished 6th in Monaco. For his part, Mansell - who had won 11 races though 1986 and 1987, more than any other driver - failed to finish the first seven races of the 1988 season. Williams had debuted their own version of the computer controlled "active suspension" on the FW11 at the 1987 Italian Grand Prix, with Nelson Piquet taking victory in the system's debut (it was called "Williams Reactive Ride" by the team as Lotus had the copyright on the "active" name in F1). Williams made revisions to the