Unlikely though since the Ecoboost is only going to be made in Europe and USA.

Wonder why they didn’t make a 1,6 turbo instead – that would easily make 170 HP and give a great low-end torque and probably an equal or better fuel-economy. It’s a downsizing trend after all at the moment

you’re welcome, worst 3…algae farming could be a big thing shortly…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algae_fuel

there’s some basic info on the wiki, too, with a bunch of references if you want to dive deeper…

Btw, the only Neons I see running are the r/t. Of course those usually die when a teenager rams them into a tree at 60mph.

However, all your points about rotaries is true. I wouldn’t buy one either. It was nice to drive one though, but I wouldn’t want to own one.

seeing that it could really help where farmland is to nutrient deficient and/or is to hot for normal farming, and it much more crop and potential for fuel per square ft. you could even put these on top of buildings to create fuel, may be even on you roof.

Getting results like those with lower grade fuel is actually a good thing.

The engine’s durability was a paradox of sorts. It was a very simple motor to work on, but only if you knew someone who knew what they were doing. The only real issues I ever had were apex seals broken by cheap plugs. Now, sadly, the car sits at the garage of the guy who built it, waiting (forever, maybe) for me to reinvest in it. Mazda used to race some of their cars with 3-rotor engines, and I always wanted to find one I could freshen up and drop into the ’79. Of course, then, exhaust, running gear, et cetera would require replacement… Never found the time to mess with it.

Please excuse my trip down rotary lane. The point is, in a sports car, with little regard for fuel economy, that engine had a time and a place. Now, fuel mileage standards, emissions standards (engine oil is part of the combustion mixture), and a lack of interest in, and understanding of, the concept all make a rotary engine-powered car prohibitive to market.

I wonder if “Ol’ Blue” still sits there…

i’m a big fan of the potential for algae-derived biofuels, but i think we’re still a few years off…i work in the biosciences, and this is something i’ve been paying attention to for a while…lots of companies are in the start up phase…the economy of scale isn’t there yet, but there’s a lot of r/d going into it right now…cool stuff, for sure…

The Rotary in the RX8 is anemic, the ONLY thing it’s fans can come up with to defend it is “great ride/handling”. Which is true, but that’s about it. I mean come on, the automatic version only has 212 horsepower and gets worse gas mileage than a V8 Mustang! Plus, I’ve never heard nice things about the reliability or long life of rotary engines (I know several RX8 owners who needed new engines well before 100K). Wonder why Mazda is the only company that uses them? It’s because they aren’t quite as sweet as Mazda would lead you to believe…

And to say that the ride can’t be duplicated in any other vehicle? Come on… I know the thing handles great, but it’s not the only great ride on the street. So I buy Mazdas premier sportscar and I get a vehicle that gets worse mileage than a 4.6L V8… only 12 more HP (In automatic guise) than a 4 Cylinder Honda Civic Si… But hey! It turns great!

I’d rather buy a Miata if I wanted great handling, at least I could trust the engine.

but I bet the Algae is more efficient by a lot. just curious dose the Algae produce the biodiesel as a waste or dose the Algae need to be processed in to it? do you have any links with more info Tetsuijinu

You did. Tell us how long your car lasted.

And btw, 30mpg today means around 37mpg from yesterday standards. Don’t forget engines today have to meet much stricter emissions standards than in 1995.

“I don’t care what Mazda does until they replace that god awful rotary.”

Man, people who say Mazda should put anything else in the RX-8 are complete idiots.

The rotary is all about weight and engine placement for a ride that cannot be duplicated in any other vehicle. Doesn’t have much torque, but that isn’t the point of the RX-8. They are improving the engine anyhow.

“I agree that 170HP from a 2.0L isn’t all that impressive. Considering Honda has had 1.6L engines that have cranked out 185 HP since the early-mid 90s, 1.8L that have cranked out 200, and in Europe, they had 2.2L cranking out 220HP, etc.”

They had a 2.0l producing 240HP, but just like everyone else here complaining about the rotary, it didn’t really go until 7000rpm. Honda’s S2000 and the rotary are made for performance cars, not an everyday driver.

Everyone looks at the HP rating, because that’s all they understand, and car makers know this and milk it as well. They forget a cars performance has more to do with the overall design of the vehicle, and not just HP. 150HP means nothing if the torque curve sucks or peaks at the wrong RPM, or the transmission is geared for MPG and not for speed, and other factors.

… which translates, inevitably, into an education problem.

From what I’ve read and talked about with some biochem engineers, we can now produce biodiesel from algae that use an insignificant amount of land and water. Therefore, we can leave corn and any other method of getting biodiesel in the past. The algae can even consume CO2 emission from coal power plants and therefore create even less of an impact on the environment. So far the only reason I can think of for not bringing diesels into the US is an image problem.

fomaypirate i don’t know what engines you are talking about in particular but if there NA they probably don’t have the torque that this 2.0 will have or the fuel economy and emission quality. Most of those engine are high revving and lack power at low rpms I would assume. I may be wrong because i don’t know what engine you talking about for sure.

The fact that this the car will start at around 15k less minimum and will be doing this on regular gas not premium. it may produce more then 170hp.

based on compression the bmw 2L i would assume require premium

And yes, then there is the food issue. At the moment I feel like I’m being squeezed from every side by politicians. Higher taxes, more restrictions and more intrusiveness on my life. I don’t need food to be turned into fuel, mandated by our government, be my next issue of even higher food prices.

Diesel isn’t quite the answer either, but I would like to see more diesels in America simply out of curiosity and a little bit of pressure off of petrol.

Too bad about the diesel.

with sorcerer’s 2014 timeline, if the US and europe synch air quality standards, and companies engineer their engines to match, then you’ll probably see a greater flow of diesels over here…(then that whole tax problem becomes more important)…

in a hippy liberal place like seattle, for example, you probably wouldn’t have much of a problem selling clean burning diesels with an emphasis on higher mpg, yadda yadda…in other places, it would probably be a tougher fight…

also, the US taxes diesel differently than in europe, so if we were all to switch to diesel, i’m not sure what the consequences would be…the price could adjust higher due to demand and work against further adoption…

An unrelated topic from other thread. I can see why ethanol additive to the gas can reduce (not eliminate) the reliance on foreign oil. I can see having ethanol additive can boost the economic and technology well being in the country. But diverting corn production for the gas production will drive up the overall food price because other corn base food products have to compete with the oil refinery for the same basis item – corn. This will have a significant impact beyond our borders as well.

but yest they do pollute more per mile.

i’m not claiming to know all the factors involved, but i don’t think these car companies are so dumb as to not sell something here that the public would buy…i’m guessing that the cost of making these motors meet our air quality standards may not justify the sales numbers…that sort of thing…