The allure of rotary engines, or Wankel units, constitutes in the fact that they can be revved very hard, very quickly and you get very precise throttle control. Now, while their applicability in road cars proved to never really be completely viable, they are much more suited for racecars and project cars, howeverm, more as an oddball thing to do, rather than having any real benefit over a conventional engine.
It may just be my own ignorance or lack of understanding towards these strange cylinder-less motors, but I wouldn’t fit one into my project car after having pulled out the stock coffee grinder that powered it from the factory. However, it seems that for the sheer joy of thrilling big crowds, rotarys do make for a real spectacle, though sadly for this Aussie driver, his extensive series of burnouts ended with said engine bursting into flames.
Granted, he did push it really hard, and kept it in high revs for ridiculous amounts of time (not healthy for any engine). This was clearly a stressful time for the rotary unit, which was doing its best to breathe out all of the burnt gasses, turning the whole exhaust system into a pretty incandescent tube, the kind you only get to see on the test bench, where they crank up engines and leave them to run for hours, in order to purposefully make them break.
Also, who uses a Holden Gemini (also badged as Opel, Isuzu, Chevrolet and Pontiac) as the start for a project car? I’m just not feeling the look of the car itself, or the way it wears its mods – the rims are frankly quite ghastly too…
By Andrei Nedelea
Story References: YouTube via Jalopnik
VIDEO