Most people haven’t heard of the engine created by Felix Wankel in the 1960s, but its derivatives may end up powering the military’s future unmanned aerial vehicles.
Despite a compact design that allows it to run at higher speeds and produce more power than conventional internal combustion engines, the Wankel engine never really caught on.
It’s bad on fuel efficiency, and it burns too much oil.
But now, engine technology company LiquidPiston Inc. may have changed that, and they want to throw their new design into military drones.
Company CEO Alec Shkolnik has a Wankel engine design that’s essentially been inverted, and he says it can increase flight endurance by more than 50 percent — the maximum length of time that an aircraft can spend in cruising flight.
“We developed what we call the X4 engine, which is like the old Wankel rotary engine, but flipped inside out,” Shkolnik said. “It solved a lot of the challenges the Wankel used to have while giving it this new thermodynamic cycle upgrade.”
In addition to the advanced flight time, LiquidPiston’s propulsion can reportedly reduce a drone’s engine heat signature and minimize vibration impact on sensitive intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance equipment.