WHY DOES THE WORLD NEED A NEW ENGINE FOR AIRCRAFT?
There are new jet engines. Why no new engines for propeller-driven aircraft?

Why haven't aviation engines advanced like car engines?
Most general aviation aircraft are still flying with engines whose basic design is 50 years old. Can you remember the last car engine that was air cooled? Wasn’t that the old Volkswagon? When was the last time a car engine had a carburetor? Why haven’t known advances in engine design come to general aviation?

Can you even imagine having to deal with your fuel mixture to make sure your car engine doesn’t overheat? Yet general aviation pilots do that all the time, right while they need to be paying attention to other things. It is way past time for a fuel injected, water cooled, thermostat temperature controlled engine, that is designed for aviation use. Especially if such an engine costs less to own and operate.

You should just be able to start the engine and fly. Let the computerized engine controller adjust the fuel injection for altitude compensation and fuel efficiency. Let the thermostat control the engine temperature. And let the built in redundancy features like dual spark plugs and dual ignition take care of basic component failures in flight. Engine related pilot workload? Forget about it – with a modern aircraft engine design.


NEW ROTARY ENGINES FOR AIRCRAFT
Years of research & development, plus space-age coatings, have yielded the ideal new aircraft engine.

Why is a new rotary engine a better choice for aircraft?
These engines are specifically manufactured for aviation. This is not an automobile engine conversion. They have dual spark plugs per each rotor, dual ignition, altitude compensating electronic engine management with fuel injection, and full in-flight engine monitoring. They are water cooled, and have metered oil injection so that they are always running on clean oil. They were designed for flying and designed to keep flying. They have a longer TBO than any piston engine, and even more impressive, they cost a small fraction to overhaul when the time does come.

Rotary engines are simple. They only have 3 moving parts. Simple means there are fewer things to go wrong which is a very good thing in the air. They also produce way less vibration than a piston engine. And they produce very high horsepower for their weight, which means a greater useful payload for the aircraft.

Rotary Aircraft Engines (RAE) is the exclusive world-wide distributor for the aviation version of the Rotamax line of rotary engines. These aviation engines can come as a complete firewall-forward (or rear-ward) configuration with a matched speed reduction unit. And they come in different sizes for different needs. They start with a single rotor 65 hp engine, and a two rotor 130 hp engine, and eventually will be available in up to a four rotor 320 hp engine and a supercharged 450 hp model. The engines are built to ASTM standards, with the plan to fully certify them.


HOW MUCH DO THEY COST?
Cost is a function of complexity.

Why rotary engines cost less to buy and maintain.
One of the real benefits of the rotary engine design, is that it is a much simpler engine, with hundreds fewer parts. There are no valves, no camshafts, no rocker arms, no lifter rods, no springs, no timing belts, and no pistons. One rotor does the work of multiple pistons. This rotary engine can be manufactured at a lower cost than piston engines with their hundreds and hundreds of complex moving parts. These new engines are a marvel of sophisticated simplicity. Way fewer parts for the horsepower yield means you pay less per horsepower. Fewer parts also mean lower labor costs and lower parts cost to overhaul. Finally an aircraft engine that can be rebuilt affordably in a day!

This engine is not a Mazda design. It is a whole new, charge cooled, advanced design, designed and made in the USA. It can run with a single rotor, for example. It does use proven Mazda seals which are widely available. But in most other respects it is a unique version of the Wankel rotary engine concept.

See all of our engine models, pricing and specifications. Click here.


AREN'T THERE PROBLEMS WITH ROTARY ENGINES?
Historical issues are a thing of the past.

Certain specific problems in the past have likely prevented rotary engines from reaching their true potential as a breakthrough engine. Leaky seals caused early Mazda engines to use too much oil. And while these engines were known for power, they were often fuel hogs. Since then, it is possibly this lingering reputation that has held back acceptance for rotary engines. But Mazda solved the seal problem by investing millions of dollars, several years ago. And new space-age, high-heat-tolerant coatings have made it possible for the engine casings to be made of aluminum alloy which is much lighter. And computer controlled machining has made it possible to create the repeatable precision that the rotors have needed to perform optimally. Basically, advances in materials and precision now make it possible for Rotamax to manufacture rotary engines for RAE which simply do not have the problems of the past.