The Spyder, first commercially-built vehicle powered by a "Wankel Engine", is of interest for several reasons. The name "Wankel" was included in descriptive material for the car. Wankel, of course, was the engine concept's inventor.
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That´s right, only 2375 were built. Teh NSU motorwors had to show, that the new NSU/Wankel rotary engine was usable as a car power unit. A lot of patens had been sold worldwide an the seller wanted to see that their engine concept was suitable for driving a car, the Spider showed it. It had alos been used successful in motorsports.
See at:
http://www.wankel-spider.de
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Mazda has since produced a huge number of rotary-engine vehicles, the name Wankel being dropped in favor of simply "rotary powered". I suspect, and seem to vaguely recall, that Mazda bought the patent rights to produce, but not positive on this.
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In between all NSU patent run out and Mazda holds a lot of actual rotary engine realtetd patents.
The rotor in our Spyder's engine was about the size of a large pie-plate, perhaps 2-1/2" thick, and had periphery seals made of carbon strips, spring-loaded to assure constant contact with the trochoidal chamber in which the rotor "spun", power being drawn from the rotor by an internally-cut gear within a hole in it's center.
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The spider engine was(is) a really tiny piec of fine mechanic. later the the carbon apex seals had been exchange by metal ones in differnet shapes, that caught other new problems.
I was at that time a young man, employed by my company only 2 years, quite "green" still, but carrying a good amount of practical experience in Automotive Engineering, even though I had obtained an A.A.S. Degree in Electronics Engineering. The person who ran the Field Test Facility, Paul Gallo, a burly, self-made mechanic of amazing ability and dislike for "helpless Engineers", took me under his wing after seeing some of my building accomplishment.
I traveled back to Chicago in 1992, and looked him up. He was still employed by Victor, 6 years older than I, and we greatly enjoyed an evening of old-times chat. At the time, I was 50; we had not seen or spoken to each other since 1972, twenty years! He was quite grateful that I would have gone to such length to see him again. In the late '90s I tried to contact him, and learned he was deceased. How I wished I had gone to see him one more time, before it was too late.......I have been, unfortunately, unable to find the Wankel Engine pics. Below is a pic of Paul Gallo, taken in 1964, working on an aftermarket speed control. After 50 years, sorry, it's the best I could do! jack
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Kack, thanks for your reponse an your historical review! bmt.
