Liquid Piston; Wankel rotary engine reinvented.

[Chief Sapulpa]

LiquidPiston | The Future of the Combustion Engine

 

[cowadle]

is this one of bought up by big auto designs we used to read about in popular mechanics back in the 70's?

 

[TANSTAAFL]

Ford did take a serious look at the rotary engine in the 1970's. Cool concept, problem was the flat surfaces that the disks would rotate on. Had a friend that had a Mazda RX-7 Turbo 2. It was fairly quick, but used a lot of oil. From what I have seen it appears that the rotary lacked the robustness of piston engines and didn't last as long as them. The buy now opportunity to invest ends in 8 days is a bit disturbing...

 

[Chief Sapulpa]

The engine distributor/trade school I attended in NJ had Mazda/Wankel company cars.

 

[Shadowrider]

Ford did take a serious look at the rotary engine in the 1970's. Cool concept, problem was the flat surfaces that the disks would rotate on. Had a friend that had a Mazda RX-7 Turbo 2. It was fairly quick, but used a lot of oil. From what I have seen it appears that the rotary lacked the robustness of piston engines and didn't last as long as them. The buy now opportunity to invest ends in 8 days is a bit disturbing...

A buddy in high school had one of the RX models with a one (non-turbo) and it ran like a raped ape. Don't know how long it lasted but he utterly hammered that thing and it didn't seem to mind. I just recall that it ran a lot better than it looked like it would, it was actually pretty impressive.

 

[Waltercat]

I know a guy that bragged about investing in the 'flying car'. That was about 30 years ago. They are still seeking investors to this day I'm told.

 

[TANSTAAFL]

A buddy in high school had one of the RX models with a one (non-turbo) and it ran like a raped ape. Don't know how long it lasted but he utterly hammered that thing and it didn't seem to mind. I just recall that it ran a lot better than it looked like it would, it was actually pretty impressive.

There are many advantages to Rotary engines, they are very lightweight too. My buddies car was fast and handled well for the time he had it. Just used a quart of oil every 2K miles. He'd use the thickest cheapest oil possible, that helped seal the combustion chambers.