A Wankel engine is a type of rotary engine, but not all rotary engines are Wankel engines. Wrapping your mind around this idea will help you to better understand the similarities as well as the ...

We look at why Mazda introduced the three-rotor 20B Wankel rotary engine, and why it only ever saw service in the Cosmo coupe ...

Mazda has never been scared to try something different, and its 1990s luxury coupe embodies this approach as well as any ...

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 ...

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 ...

In theory, Wankel-style rotary internal combustion engines have many advantages: they ditch the cumbersome crankcase and piston design, replacing it with a simple, single-chamber design and a thick, ...

Rotary engines such as the Wankel have strange shapes that can be difficult to machine (as evidenced by the specialized production machines and patents in the 70s), which means it lends itself well to ...

You'd think measuring an engine's displacement would be simple, but there's a long history of trying to figure out how to ...

When Mazda discontinued the RX-8, most people assumed the rotary engine was finished. The RX-8 was the last production car to use Mazda's signature Wankel rotary, and its departure seemed to signal ...