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by astral303 1175 days ago
rotary engines do not really scream at peak power... this is why Mazda has plans to use rotary at peak power to generate electricity for their hybrid EVs.

re 20 years to make a new engine point, compare investment $ in traditional ICE across the car industry vs investment $ into rotary or other alternative engines (the former is order of magnitudes more)

2 comments

Mazda still holding on to those rotary engines, eh?

Still, call my interest piqued. I'll keep an eye out for their Wankel-EVs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3gzQVGEqF4 explains the details. As usual Jason's awesome at explaining the details.
The issue with Wankels has always been seals.
As cool as the rotary engine is, Mazda’s attempt at a rotary hybrid is flogging the deadest of dead horses.
We will be driving an old RX7 in the '24 hours of Lemons' this year. Looking forward to pushing it in a nice casual race. Mechanically, we were not at a point where it was solid enough for 2022. I think the rotary engine was the only thing that was working. :)
Was it really THAT good? | The Story of the Mazda 787B (Mazda winning Le Mans): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vm1BoGf3uuU

Mazda won Le Mans 8 times (And we all forgot about it): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZ2cmZJjztI

I guess you already seen it, but for anyone who shouts at Wankel engine unreliability, small plug for Rob Dahm and his video about fixing that engine biggest problems: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwM6JJYPzkM
Good luck with the seals! Between rotary and Stirling I find it hard to pick a favorite and both of them have similar problems despite the completely different geometry.