Rotary engines (also known as Wankel engines and Wankel rotary engines) are quite different from piston or "reciprocating" engines. One of the distinguishing features is that they don't need valves to ...

The original concept of combustion engines as we understand them dates as far back as the late 1800s. And while they are more or less a solved science today, they definitely didn't start that way.

As we begin the last article in this series on the basics of the internal combustion engine, let's stop to review what we've covered during the last five articles. We began last May by detailIing the ...

If you've ever looked under the bonnet of a car, the engine can seem like a maze of metal parts, pipes and wires. In reality, its job is quite simple: it turns fuel into the power that moves your car.

Any certified gearhead knows that diesel engines do not use spark plugs. But why not? If power in an engine is created by combustion or explosion of flammable liquids, won't a spark plug in a diesel ...

How boxer engines work, why they’re not just “flat” engines, and a 120-year evolution traced from the 1899 Benz to the latest Porsche and Subaru boxers.