Pop the hood on a classic Mazda RX-7 or RX-8 and the engine bay looks oddly empty. That is the charm of the rotary engine: a compact lump of metal that trades pistons and valves for a spinning ...

It rose to prominence in the Mazda RX-7 model line, but the last new car feature one was the Mazda RX-8. Since then, Mazda has been continually developing the technology with the aim of bringing it ...

Justin Cupler has been a member of the TopSpeed team since 2012. Justin's love for cars started back when he was just five years old, helping his dad work on his 1957 Chevy Bell Air and then his 1966 ...

Antonio is a chemical engineering student pursuing his master's degree in chemical engineering and sustainable processes. Throughout his academic journey, he has gained substantial knowledge in areas ...

The automotive world hasn’t seen a rotary engine in production since the Mazda RX-8 was axed in 2012. However, the Crighton CR700W is bringing it back in spectacular fashion in a machine billed as the ...

Mazda has been building new parts for the original MX-5 Miata for a couple of years and even offers a full restoration service over in Japan. Now it's expanding the parts program to the RX-7, ...

The engine in question was the Wankel rotary, named after German engineer Felix Wankel, who first patented the concept in 1929. Instead of pistons moving back and forth, the rotary engine used a ...

Through the history of internal combustion engines, there has been plenty of evolution, but few revolutions. Talk of radically different designs always leads to a single name – Wankel. The Wankel ...

The traditional piston engine has garnered the vast majority of attention and application in the internal combustion age, but there was another: the Wankel rotary engine. German engineer Felix Wankel ...

You're a master of all things LS. You completely understand the Ford FE big blocks. Those Honda B16 engines are no match for your knowledge base. At their core, these engines all behave the same way.

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, ...