The only way I can have a rotary powered car is swapping engine. I have 96' Fiat 126 (2 cyl, air cooled, rear engine, rwd, about 1300lbs) so I'm wondering if it is possible to put a 12A in it. Anyone done this before or know something useful?

wow, i'm not even sure we got the 126 in the us. do you know if you can put a vw tranny into it? you can bolt the rotary to the vw tranny, with an adaptor.



mike

It is possible to put VW tranny into 126 but I wonder in which direction the vw engine rotates?

VW engines and rotaries rotate the same direction. Corvair and Honda engines rotate backwards.

Thanx for help! Gotta search for 12A in good condition maybe in Germany. There are Vw's in Poland so I can find a tranny in here I guess....

sounds like it should be a neat project



mike

Hi!



Me and my mate are back to the project. We decided to put a 13b single turbo from 2nd gen. Rx7. An engine will be mid mounted, bolted to the Fiat Punto 6spd manual gearbox (fwd). We are also planning to use Punto suspension cause 126's suspension is a total useless crap. 126 weights only about 0,6 - 0,65 tonne so it will be great power-to-weight ratio car. We need as much information about 13b single turbo as we can get. Here are some photos of 126 with 1400cc inline 4cyl. turbo puting down 150hp. Imagine same car but 200Hp+ rotary engine powered.

Any info, ideas, knowledge very useful....





http://www.ktsw.hat.pl/kaza/5.jpg

http://www.ktsw.hat.pl/kaza/2.jpg

http://www.wrc.neostrada.pl/kaza.jpg

Nice project!



FWD cars are a challange with a rotary due to a CV shaft being very close to the intake/exhaust manifolding. I hope to take on a project of that caliber some day.

It isn't FWD car, we're gonna have only engine+gearbox mounted crosswise (like FWD) but transmission is RWD, with that weight (approx. 700kg) we should rock https://www.nopistons.com/forums/pub...IR#>/smile.png Give me info about 13b as much as possible, especially dimensions (width,length) of course with manifolds,electricity and so on ...

Might not be a fwd car but you will still have the problems of a fwd car that is spoken about above. In a piston engine the exhaust and intake mount on the head. The head is mounted above the block. In a transverse mounted car the axleshaft runs beside the block to get to the other side of the car from the transmission. But on a rotary the exhaust sits very low on the motor so you may have clearance problems. Not a definate problem however something to watch for. And especially with a turbo as that makes the exhaust even bigger.

I found some dimensions in a bokk. These are old dimensions for the rotary as availiable in '84 and older cars. Not sure what changes came later but this should give you a starting point. Also these dimms are in inches so you will have to convert for metric.

for a 13B motor:

from the back of the motor where the tranny bolts to the front of the crank pully is 16.70 inches.

from the back of the block to the front of the water pump pulley is 18.5 inches.

from the bottom of the oil pan to the top of the thermostat housing is 20 inches.

from the outside edge of the oil pan rail from one side to the other is 12.75 inches. The angle of the distributor on a motor with a dist causes the dist to stick out farther than the above dimms. Also the thermostat housing sticks out to the oposite side of the dist beyond the above dimms. A header without turbo will stick out aproximatly 5.5 inches beyond the oil pan rail. The dimms that I can see says the motor is about 16 to 17 inches wide from dist to thermostat housing.

Hope this helps at least a little.

Thanx a lot 4 the info! We know that it won't be easy to put the 13b turbo into this little, tiny old school Fiat but we think it's worth having 3kgs/hp ratio. Better than Ferrari Modena..... https://www.nopistons.com/forums/pub...#>/biggrin.png

Not to mention the sleeper factor and the cost difference.

You can't even imagine how hard is to get a rotary engine in Poland. I haven't even seen a rotary engine powered car on the road in my town. So our project will be pretty exotic. How much is the stock whole seal kit( you know apex seals, side seals...) for 13b turbo in US?

Do you have any ideas of the cheapest way of getting stock 13b turbo with for example 50-80k km on it?

We'll be getiing a brand new body of Fiat 126 this week, so it sounds like the beginning....https://www.nopistons.com/forums/pub...#>/biggrin.png

At least, we have a 2000 Fiat 126elx shell. It should be a nice base to start our project. Now were gonna look for the 13B, that won't be easy...

This is how it looks now....



http://www.wrc.neostrada.pl/buda01.jpg

http://www.wrc.neostrada.pl/buda02.jpg



And this is how we want it to look like:



http://www.wrc.neostrada.pl/rafal1.jpg

http://www.wrc.neostrada.pl/rafal2.jpg

I have seen a Fiat 1800 CC engine in an X-19. Nice fit. Well done.



I helped a friend install a small block Chevrolet in a Mini Cooper. We used a narrowed 8" ford rear end. A Chevette front subframe and running gear. The Chevette subframe gives you the steering and complete front suspension. Also used on the Corvair and Pontiac mid engined Fiero.



Two methods of assembly may be involved. The space involved requires gutting the car to an empty shell, and building a tube chassis for the whole car. Or, gutting the area where the engine install will be done, and building a subframe for that area. Notice that the rotary is short (length and height) and fat. This rules out most side winder transmissions that work in small cars.



Perhaps a unit from a V-6 powered car could be found. The half shafts will be very short and torque steer a problem. A mid engine with VW or Audi front drive trans would be easy, but you may be out of space to sit. An automatic trans would ease construction.



If you have no rotary skills already I would not get involved. Perhaps a 4 cylinder rocket bike engine would be a better fit.



12-A stuff is vertually extinct. No more irons or rotor housings or rotors. Even 13B stuff from the 80s is getting hard to find in junk yards. Still available as new stock. But very pricy.



Good luck.



Lynn E. Hanover

how about a 13b in a fiero? lol i love mid-engine cars and rotaries, so all the better to combine them lol