My hunch is they were destroyed, but like the stacked 4 rotor race motor, you never know what hangs around marine engineering or with former engineering employees. Perhaps John Sheldon or George Miller could shed some light on this.
Printable View
I believe there are 4 race OMC rotary's still around, maybe even 5 :eek::eek:. 2 definately in a private collection. John S. knows more. Could be at least one at BRP, but trying to penetrate the BRP veil is like extracting teeth from a chook aka chicken.
Guys: With the demise of OMC and the take over of Marine Engineering by Rotax, I suspect all of the old prototypes have been long since thrown away. Most of the old OMC buildings have been torn down and the places where this stuff was stored went with them. As of last summer, there were 5 rotary race engines surviving; 2 in a private collection and 3 at BRP. I was told when Rotax took over, they ordered all the old OMC stuff to be disposed of. I have also seen a picture of a prototye rotary outboard, but believe it was of a later vintage based on the 650cc engine. Us race guys, both old and new, would like to see some of the racing outboard history preserved and be available for public viewing, but in the production sceem of things, prototype engines like the rotary has little meaning to production outboard history. Rotax has a history in go kart racing so maybe someone there will at least see some of these engines get preserved for public viewing; lets hope so.
Wow, thanks so much Mr Finley, at least now I've SEEN one running.
You are right, that audio most certainly is not that of a 4 rotor wankel. That's a sound you'll never forget once you've been in it's presence. Fortunately audio does exist... unfortunately it's in land-based form:
Mazda 787B
I like this one better!
Mark N
<iframe width="960" height="750" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/9675TKafw3g" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Picky Picky
Ok I don't want to hijack the best thread on the board but just to convert Mark75H to rotary power:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upeNfS4sIgU
I didn't say I didn't like rotaries ... I just don't care for the one clip. I like the other one with the car on the track
Not complaining about how it sounds ... what turns me off in that video is that it never runs over idle for more than a half second at a time ... that does not impress me that you are hearing the sound of the motor at speed