ORIGINAL: fastpat
I did a search on this engine and found some very good information, but there is one question I've not seen asked nor answered.
I know about the fuel consumption issue, and the other issues with this engine.
This Wankel, the second version, has the exhaust coming out of one side of the cylinder housing, and the carb as well. Since I will be using two of them on a Duellist kit, I'd like to reverse the cylinder housing so that the exhaust exits from the opposite side on one of the engines. Anyone know if that's possible with this engine? I own one and am ordering another, but the one that I have is packed away in storage, so I can't look at it, or disassemble it to check the feasibility of this change. From looking at photos this could be done, changing not only the exhaust exit location, but the direction of rotation as well.
Pat
I'm a rotary fan and have done some investigation into the OS engine *BUT* have never played with one.
The cylinder housing you mention is the rotor housing. The exhaust and intake on the OS engine is "peripheral" which means the ports are basically a hole leading straight into the engine.
Most rotary engines cannot have the housing flipped around to move the ports to the opposite side. It may be possible with the OS but I've yet to take a good look at the design of the internals. If the housing is flipped around, then the engine will run the opposite direction (it has to). That would cause starting problems as you'd need to remember which way to have the starter setup for each engine.
My suspicion is that it's probably not a good idea to flip the housing. Being a air cooled engine the cooling fins are probably concentrated on the combustion side of the rotor with a lesser amount on the intake/compression side. Hence, if you flip the housing you'll have reduced cooling where it's needed and too much where it's not....that's gotta hurt the engine.
If you reverse the rotation by flipping the housing, double check the apex seals. They may be directional so, you'd need to flip them to. Oh, same may go for the rotor *IF* it has any form of combustion recess in the rotor face.
Rather than flip the housing, would rotating the engine 180degrees work? It may put the muffler in a less than ideal position but you won't know until you check it.
As a final comment, I've heard someone complaining that they spun their OS wankel in reverse and it damaged the seals. This may suggest there are direction issues with the internal parts.