So i love my camaro to death and would never get rid of it but my buddy wants to go 50 50 on a 88 rx7 project...does anyone know anything about the rotary engine?

 

all i really know is that there expensive to work on... but a good running rx7 makes tons of power with few moving parts.. is it a turbo???

 

They are super fun cars. What will you guys be doing with it? They make fantastic autocross cars. Especially with the weight distribution, tons of fun, very forgiving cars handling wise and those engines will rev to the moon and back.

Agreed with basic concepts, they can be spendy to work on, especially if you get a pile. It always seems like the previous owners have driven the absolute **** out of the car and a bunch of crap always needs fixed.

If you can get a really good example that doesn't need a lot it'd be a lot more fun for you.

Check out rx7club - they have a good forum and a lot of info and tech tutorials, a buyers guide (if i recall) and all the basics of rotary engines you could ever know. I wanted a 3rd gen for a long long time and spent a lot of time on their forum, nice people.

 

if im not mistaken they rev to 13k maybe 14 my boss is obsessed with them he knows EVERYTHING if you do end up getting the car you can pm me questions and i can ask him... hes what they call a rotor head

 

They are pretty cool pieces of engineering really. They most definitely can rev high. You ever seen the Le Mans car they made? Psychotic car...

The sound of it coming down the track is enough to make you pee your pants.
Fast forward to 1:00
YouTube - ‪Mazda 787B at Mazda Miyoshi prooving ground (1)‬‏

 

Yeah, piston engine goes boing-boing-boing, and the Mazda goes hmmmmmm. (old TV commercial)
I had an 88 for a short while, was the brother in laws car. It was the Turbo II model and was pretty quick, once I cleaned out the melted down pre-cat. My neighbor has an 87 non-turbo, and it's a dog by comparison. You want the turbo if you want the car to move...or a SBC in it would be better!! Generally, once the rotary engine gets in the 80k miles range, it's gonna be needing some work. The apex seals don't wear as long like a piston engine's rings do, it's a different animal. Some get lucky and get more useful miles than that, but this one was feeling it already. Being a turbo engine probably didn't help matters any. Oh, and don't mix up the spark plugs. The engine has two rotors, and each has two different type spark plugs, a primary and secondary.

 

i think some had 3 rotors at least that what i thought my boss said

 

Okay ill checkout that forum and thanks this has helped me understand them better im gonna test drive it tomorrow hopefully

 

just checked with my boss all stock rx7s have 2 rotors but theres a Japanese rx7 that has 4 rotors that revs to 20k at 850whp

 

One thing you need to know about the rotary is how its induction works. They don't have valves like we do, air is sucked in by the rotating assembly. This makes for a wide smooth torque curve, at one expense. It needs to be spinning fast. Driving one will be the exact opposite of driving a pushrod motor.
This is something you're going to want as a second car. I looked into one, but decided against it, with maintenance, fuel economy, and daily driveablility in mind. Id kill for one as a second car.