For more than a decade the name Wankel has popped up whenever car enthusiasts start talking about advanced-design automotive powerplants. The theory of the Wankel engine goes back to 1954 when Dr.

Rotary engines (also known as Wankel engines and Wankel rotary engines) are quite different from piston or "reciprocating" engines. One of the distinguishing features is that they don't need valves to ...

The rotary engine is unique in its success and failure and its ability to make an impact with a completely different way of thinking. As it is, every production car for the last 130 years, aside from ...

Rotary engines, known for their unique design and compact size, have been predominantly associated with Mazda. However, engineers and automotive enthusiasts have experimented with incorporating these ...

In the 1920s, Felix Wankel thought that the conventional approach to engine design was not complicated enough and so, in a classic case of thinking outside the box, came up with his novel rotary ...

Mazda’s rotary engine is coming back in the spotlight, but this time it’s not just a nostalgic callback to the RX-7 glory days. Instead, it’s quietly shaping the brand’s electrified future. Rather ...

How the 13B-MSP Renesis evolved from earlier Mazda rotary designs, technical features explained, and common problems and maintenance issues discussed. The 13B-MSP Renesis rotary engine powered the ...

The rotary engine, with its egg-like block and triangular rotor, is an oddball even among all the other oddball engine designs—sorry, three-cylinder, twin-turbo, camless Koenigsegg, ya basic. That ...

Alina has been enthusiastic about vehicles her entire life, and even from an early age found herself itching to get behind the wheel. Through high school and college, she could be found reading ...

For a time, the Wankel rotary engine seemed like the future. In 1963, German automaker NSU—later absorbed into Audi—debuted the Wankel Spider, the first internal-combustion production car not powered ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Peter Lyon is based in Tokyo and writes about the car industry. Mazda’s rotary engine has been officially reborn, but not quite in ...