WI: Nazi Germany Develops the Wankel Engine

Status
Not open for further replies.
Well. the reliability of Wankel engines was rather poor even in OTL's late 60ies / early 70ies as my uncle with his NSU Ro 80 could attest if he was still alive. But it certainly was one hell of a cool car for its' day and age.
 

Delta Force

Banned
The high power to weight ratio might be useful in a motorjet which has a gasoline engine driving the compressor and side stepping developmental problems with the turbine.

If you can make motorjets there's no reason not to make turbojets instead. They never found an advantage for motorjets and other hybrid propulsion systems.
 
Last edited:
I don't know where the reputation for being unreliable is coming from. Wankel engines have been successfully used in automobile racing, aviation, and seat belt pre-tensioners, all roles where reliability is vital.

They got that way eventually. But, have you ever read the development history of the engine? It took '60s tech and lots of manhours to get seals that lasted long enough to be useful, iirc. So in the '40s, in nazi germany with alloy and other material shortages? Theyd be about as reliable as nazi jet engines....
 

Delta Force

Banned
What about developing Wankel engines for the Volkswagen? They were having trouble with getting costs down, so something with a smaller number of parts might be attractive. Because the Volkswagen is a small car it could share a similar rotor diameter with a motorcycle, and the engines could be used for other vehicles too.

Another thing to keep in mind is that a more simple engine design might even potentially save energy even if it consumes more fuel. Building all the components that go into a conventional internal combustion engine probably consumes a lot more energy and manpower than building a simple Wankel unit. There could be more electricity and manpower available for other uses. Germany also had some rather poor vehicle component logistics for trucks and cars, so a standardized power unit could help improve fleet maintenance.
 
It took Mazda decades until they could win le mans with one, and they never could make it reliable as a road engine. A friend of mine used to have a Maxda RX-8 and it had a power band so narrow it had to be driven on the redline all the time, with horrible fuel consunption, and used oil so badly that on trips he had to look up garages as much as hotels.

What Germany needed was diesels. More and better diesels earlier on.
 
>tfw I notice the name of the engine


tumblr_mskkwmFaU21rf3nebo2_250.gif


God I'm so immature :p
 
THe war ending so quickly is a bit of a joke, but to be perfectly honest do some research on Mazda RX8s. You will not find one with an original engine and less than 120,000 miles.
My Dad had both 1st and 2nd gen RX-7s and I remember him saying the one thing they should have added was a separate oil tank with a metering valve, same as the Japanese two strokes of the 1970s. This was due to the Mazda's high oil consumption. Other than that, we liked the cars.

If the Germans want to develop a useful engine, they only need take their Jumo aero diesels and modify them for tank use. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkers_Jumo_205
 
Since we're talking about unconventional options, what about auxiliary power units and starter carts for heating tank tracks and engines and starting aircraft? Wankel engines are ideal as APUs because of their compactness. I'm not sure if piston aircraft used starter carts in the 1930s though, is that more of a turbojet era thing?

StarterTruck-ToyotaGB.jpg

Japanese saved some weight on leaving out starters and heavy batteries

VVS too
unm505.jpg


Most pre USAAF heavy bombers didn't have much for powered systems, so no real reason for APUs

Now US tanks did have small two stroke air cooled motor for charging batteries and running the radio
 
I don't know where the reputation for being unreliable is coming from. Wankel engines have been successfully used in automobile racing, aviation, and seat belt pre-tensioners, all roles where reliability is vital.

There was a big push for Wankels in the late '60s-70s.

Many snowmobiles had them.

hqdefault.jpg


Terrible reliability for seals, and power was 45HP@5500rpm for 528cc
A two stroke 440cc with a pipe could do 45HP, reliably.
There's a reason everybody went back to twin cylinder two strokes by 1976.

On paper, they look great, low vibration, good power band.

But the poor fuel economy( Oil crisis, recall) and the fast drop off in power doomed them
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top