Not 2 Stroke, not 4 Stroke...

[Kodackamera]

Challengers - Mazda Stories

New Mazda advert in the UK.

[MyckMcClung]

yeah rotary motor are cool!! I'd like to see a rotary dirt bike.

[ACMX]

Haha that was cool

[factoryX]

rotary motors are cool, but have a crazy amount of problems.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wankel_engine

[yo_marc]

I believe there was a rotary engine motorcycle at some point.  Or maybe I'm thinking about an old snowmobile...

[factoryX]

I believe both. 

[SachsGS]

Sachs made Wankel engined street bikes,chainsaws,snowmobile powerplants,stationary motors and special ISDT dirt bikes.I was told that a Sachs rotary powered firepump setup was the best by a ship's captain.

[msmola2002]

first kick start of Suzuki RE-5

http://www.suzukicycles.org/RE5/RE5-Rotary.shtml


rotaries are awesome I have a mate back in newcastle putting a 12A peripheral port (ie, very angry) into a datsun 1600/510

[TMKIWI]

Norton built some sucessful rotary's in the 90's

http://youtu.be/LwRXke5Msgk

Here is the new one they have been testing. I'll bring the marshmellows.

http://youtu.be/5P_JkddDw90

[Bioflex]

I'm a huge rotary fan, having owned many over the last 14 years.
They are more tempermantal than 4 stroke engines but given
Mazda have been the sole developers of them for the last 35 years (NSU, Mercedes and everyone else had thrown in the towel by then) they have done quite well.

A huge amount of power given their capacity and porterd motors make awesome 2 stroke like powerbands.

Interestingly, rotaries have had a lot of success in racing, and while 4 strokes are more economical and reliable when not stressed, when fully worked they seem to have a higher failure rate ( and are much more expensive than rotaries)
hmmmm, this sound familiar to anyone?

Let's blame the valves and camshafts, neither rotaries or 2 smokers have them

[JETZcorp]

I agree, I like rotaries for a lot of the same reasons I like two-strokes.  Low number of moving parts, high power per unit displacement, etc.  I don't know if I'd want one for cruising everyday, though.  As much as we all like bashing the four-strokes, if you're looking for something that will trundle along at eighth-throttle for three hours a day, every single day, it's hard to get more reliable than a giant four-stroke with no real power to speak of.  It's when someone takes that design and tries to make it into a performance machine, that you start having problems.

[Kodackamera]

I can't get the 787b out of my head, it's too amazing.

[TMKIWI]

I can't get the 787b out of my head, it's too amazing.

I was living in the UK when the Mazda won Le Mans and my boss went over to the race.
When he came back he couldn't stop talking about the amazing sound of the rotary.
Because most cars were turbo and were reasonably quiet, when the Mazdas went pass during the night he said you didn't have to look up to know what it was. I was jealous as hell.

Its a shame that the FIA quickly outlawed them.

[SachsGS]

There was once this guy down the street and he had three RE-5's parked under a tree in his back yard.He wouldn't sell them and I believe they were eventually hauled away for scrap!

The 90's Norton Rotarys were based on two Sachs wankels sandwiched together.

[JETZcorp]

Of course, there are other engines that aren't two-strokes or four-strokes, which are pretty awesome.

There's the classic one-stroke steam engine, which is just pure elegance
SP 4449 4-15-07 crossing at Roberts, Oregon

Then there's the jet-turbine, which is the engine of choice for anyone who desperately wants to do something ridiculous.
Van with gas turbine helicopter engine

And then there's the six-stroke, which as you would imagine is just fucking stupid.
V8 Six Stroke Engine