What is a Rotary Engine?

Question

I was talking to my barber while having my hair cut when we got on to the subject of cars and i asked him what did he drive? He said he drove a Mazda MX 8 i think. I then asked him what size engine it was and was surprised to hear that it was only a 1.3 but then he explained that it was a rotary engine and thats what gave it a lot more power. So my question is what is a rotary engine and how is it different from other engines

Answer 1

The rotary engine is a type of internal combustion engine with a substantially different design than that of the much more common piston engine. In a conventional piston engine, a compressed fuel-air mixture is ignited in a closed chamber by a spark plug, causing the rapid expansion of superheated gas. Repeating this cycle causes the characteristic up-down motion of pistons in an engine, which is converted into rotational motion used to drive the wheels of an automobile or the propeller of a plane or boat.

Although the rotary engine is theoretically more elegant than a piston engine, and requires less moving parts, the wear and tear caused on the apexes of the triangle moving rapidly within the housing of the rotary engine has proven unacceptable to most auto companies considering the creation of production models. Today, Mazda is the only company which continues to sell cars that use rotary engines. Fundamentally, the idea of an engine which replaces the jerky up-down motion of a reciprocating piston engine with smooth rotational motion is quite appealing, but practical considerations have thus far prevented them from displacing the conventional engine. Perhaps with the introduction of new materials or insights, the rotary engine will one day become the most prominent form of internal combustion engine.

Answer 2

A rotary engine is a Japanese designed engine, which instead of using pistons like a normal car it has a triangle rotor inside of a oval shaped bore. The rotor moves on an eccentric shaft completing the 4 stroke cycle Induction Compression Power exhaust. It is a very efficient engine even finding its way into motorcycles! The engine is also very expensive to produce which is why we don't see the engine anywhere except the Mazda Rx range. The engine is also known as a "Wankel" engine due to the designer a German called Robert Wankel.

Answer 3

The engine is called a Wankel after the inventor, it is a two stroke engine and works in an entirely different way than a conventional engine , , there are two triangler operating blocks that rotate in the centre of the engine as the rotate they also Ellipt so that as one face of the triangle comes to the top the space between it and the facing gets smaller creating compression , once the spark plug has fired the compressed fuel (petrol) fires driving the rotor round as it goes round there is an open port to the exhaust and the fumes are expelled , the next faze the rotor passes another port which leads to a carburetter or injects petrol and as the rotor passes this port the gap between the facings get bigger gr-eating induction . these engine are do not have more power but rev much quicker giving the allusion that they are faster , but nothing is for nothing they are greedy engines with poor fuel economy , and when they go wrong they are extraordinarily expensive

Answer 4

A rotary engine has no pistons, instead there is a rotating hub that provides for the compression of the air fuel mixture and exhaust and intake of gasses.
These engines kind of defile the system of defining displacement, because there is no bore and stoke as such.
Larger engines can be built by stacking the assemblies together also.
Until the advent of computer controls for spark advance, and fuel mixture these engines were falling out of production. But due to advances in the computer engines they are returning with more punch.

Answer 5

The Wankel rotary engine is a type of internal combustion engine, invented by a German engineer Felix Wankel, which uses a rotor instead of reciprocating pistons. This design delivers smooth high-rpm power from a compact, lightweight engine.

go here for more,,,,,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wankel_engine

Answer 6

which uses a rotor instead of reciprocating pistons. This design delivers smooth high-rpm power from a compact, lightweight engine.

Answer 7

Instead of pistons it has rotors. Check this site for animated rotary engine.
http://www.keveney.com/Wankel.html

Answer 8

rotary engine does not have pistons,it has triangle shaped rotary units...google the wankle engine and you will understand the principal

Answer 9

Think it's more likely to be an RX-8?? They have a wankel engine (just tell him to hope and pray that nothing ever goes wronh with it!! EXPENSIVE!!)

Answer 10

Wankel engine.

Click this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wankel_engine

Contains a detailed explanation with pictures and stuff.

ADDED:
Oh darn someone beat me to it......