Audi Wankel

[Grant Lenahan]

wankels are widely used in generators?

incidentally, the RX-8 is STILL know for awful fuel economy.

Pushrods have never been known for inefficiency - for low RPMs, yes. But 
then, high rpms mean high frictional losses :-)

Wankels, OTOH have problems with "valve" timing whcih is very hard, (or 
is that well near impossible? sure seems difficult) to vary, and with 
short rotor dispalcement, as you noted.

I'm still skeptical.

interested in the experience from generators. are these portable, 
industrial, what? I'm only familiar with reciprocating and, of course, 
industrial turbines.

Grant

On 6/22/2010 4:32 PM, NIck Miller wrote:
> Wankel's are inefficient just like pushrod motors are outdated and 
> "old techology."  Right, Mr. C6-z06 Vette?
>
> Rotary's were pretty bad in the 70's during mazda's wankel Hey-day, 
> but the Rx-8 is not terribly bad for what it is, and you do find 
> rotary's in a lot of applications (like generators) outside of the 
> automotive industry.  They are a small segment of every market they 
> are in, but they have continued to develop just like every other sort 
> of internal combustion engine has through the years.  Supposedly the 
> newest rotary, going from 1.3l to 2.0l, will have even better 
> charecteristics because one of the issues was drag/size of the motor, 
> and supposedly this will help a lot with efficiency in the newest 
> rendition.   This concept can be compared to "stroking" a motor, where 
> you get too much drag on the piston up and down the sidwall, lowering 
> its rpm limit.  Same idea behind F1 motors having big pistons + small 
> stroke = lots or rpms...
>
> Either way its a cool concept.
>