The rotary engine has been absent on the frontline for quite some time, and it's on the way back. But not with Mazda.

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 ...

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 ...

The Wankel rotary engine is known for its troubled life in the mainstream automotive industry, its high power-to-weight ratio, and the intoxicating buzz it makes at full tilt. Popular with die-hard ...

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 ...

Jeremy Weber May 25, 2009 Comment Now! Mazda's renowned rotary Wankel engine has been a staple in some of the carmaker’s sports cars for the last 44 years, with its first appearance in 1965 and its ...

In a world dominated by pistons, the rotary engine was something different for motorists. It was the vision of German engineer Felix Wankel, built on the belief that the up-and-down motion of pistons ...

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 ...

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, ...

The rotary engine had its moment of automotive glory with Mazda, but while the Japanese automaker's rotary engines where small-displacement, high-revving, buzz bombs, one American startup tried a very ...