The internal combustion engine, for all its mechanical sophistication, still runs on a 19th-century mechanical idea: pistons rising and falling, a crankshaft spinning, a steam-age architecture ...

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, ...

You hear endless myths about the Mazda RX-7, from breathless praise of its “magic” to horror stories about blown apex seals.

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 ...

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 ...

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 ...

Mazda’s rotary engine has been officially reborn, but not quite in the way you might think. Yes, we saw a drop-dead gorgeous Iconic SP rotary-hybrid coupe concept unveiled at last October’s Japan ...

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 ...

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 ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Peter Lyon is based in Tokyo and writes about the car industry. At the Japan Mobility Show two years ago, Mazda unveiled a ...