Do you think it's possible to put a rotary engine inside a fiero? The hallmark of the fiero is that it's so light, and with a rotary engine, it could be even lighter with about the same power (or more).

Just something that I was thinking about earlier today.

click the little blue search button, might find something!

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'84 2m4 se, a work in progress http://www.mtsu.edu/~mkr2c/fiero.htm

I asked the same question when I first joined the forum. Someone out in California was working on such a conversion. I never found out what the outcome was.

Anything is possible with enough cash. I had contemplated installing a 3 rotor engine at one point but think I keeping the engine cool enough might be a problem as a rotor engine tends to run hotter than a reciprocating engine. I'd sure like to see one in a Fiero though as IMO they sound a LOT better than a piston engine. VERY smooth for the size and quite a bit of power in a small package.

I have a friend into Fieros and RX-7s. He doesn't think it can be done. Something about the position of the axles and the engine.

There's no doubt that it can be done. I think "how much?" is the proper question. I'm thinking it might be too much to be cost effective. Those motors are pains in the ass if you ask me, but some people love them. I'd look at some of the Rx-7 boards. Alot of guys there do SBC swaps. So it would be like doing a Fiero SBC swap and then working backwards Rx-7 style. I don't think you'll find much searching save more posts with inconsiderate replies telling you to "Search". The best thing I can say is to familiarize yourself with the rotary motor if its what you really want to do and be an innovator. I remember something about someone working on a swap kit and not being able to use the fiero tranny but it just dissapeared. Good luck.

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I was thinking about the same swap at first.
I think one of the probs is the gearing in the transmission. the final drive in a rx-7 is 4:10 so to get the same take off power you'd be stuck with the 4 speed. unless you find a 5 or 6-speed transmission outside of gm a honda or mazda. the thing to do would be to go to your local tuner shop and ask them about swaps into hondas or something
and use that info to work on the fiero.
If you say fiero they start asking why a fiero??? ask if a rotary has been installed transversely and ask what transmission they used. how hard, and what times is the guy getting in the quarter mile. you don't want to end up with a slow go car. your top end would be up with lambos but you'd lose control before those speeds were reached.
a 6-speed on a v-tech motor might work concidering they are high revvers. I'll have to do some looking.

I'll stop rambling now. hop this helps.

marcus

Unless you were going to use a turbo charged rotary I wouldn't think it would be worth the trouble. Even the later 13b's were only rated around 140hp. I'm sure you could find a way to bolt it up. The other factor is that older high milage rotarys do not take abusr real well. And given the cost of rebuilding one, that should also be a factor.....

Agreed. To get descent power out of a rotary, it's got to be turbo. The turbo gears adds so much extra weight that a turbo rotary is not that much lighter than a V8. Check out www.grannysspeedshop.com for weight figures, but an LT1 3rd gen RX7 only gains 50 lbs over the front wheels.

Another thought is that a rotary on boost is living on borrowed time. Boosted rotaries have NOT established a stellar reliability record.

I am not intimately familiar with rotaries, but I'd compare the different geometries of the two motors. I've read on other forums that part of the reason converting a RX-7 to a 350 small block is so easy is the position of the power output of the engine.

Consider: The SBC crankshaft exits the back of the motor fairly low. The rotary, on the other hand, exits about the middle of the motor. That means that a car designed for a rotary engine will have a fairly high transmission tunnel, making it pretty easy to put any transmission you please behind the motor.

CONVERSLY, if you wanted to mate a rotary to a Fiero transmission you might have to mount the rotary so low (to preserve the proper relationship between the transmission output and the wheels) that it might drag the ground.

Hey, don't laugh! Like I said, I don't know that much about rotaries. But it's something to consider.