Diesel Rotaries

[crashdog]

Hi all,

 

I was doing some research for a marine diesel electric application and noticed that both Wankel (www.wankel-rotary.com) and Rotary Power International (www.rotarypowereinternational.com) were in late stage development on heavy fuel rotaries. Interesting, and not the least because it is going to confuse the hell out of the current forum structure here.

 

Does anyone have any information on these engines?

 

cheers

 

blue

[LargePrime]

i belive rotary powers site says they are in production

[KeithO]

Meanwhile the web sites are down, but these are spark ignited diesels. They have a normal gasoline compression ratio (9-10:1 as opposed to 18:1 for compression ignition). The result is that while they may run on diesel, they are not really comparable in efficiency to a normal diesel. The reason these engines were developed is the US military's "1 fuel" initiative. They basically want everything to run on Jet A to ease logistics.

[JCPJCP]

Yes, gasoline compression ratio numbers.

However, note they are lean burn designs with unthrottled airflow.

 

Should have better fuel consumption than a gas engine, but slightly poorer than a true high compression diesel design.

 

A lot of patents were issued (and now expired) to John Deere on this approach to a diesel burning wankel.

 

JCP