Originally Posted by smarthawke
Despite the good things about mags, the future is ignition systems like the Rotax 912. In fact the Rotax 912 is the engine of future GA. Be it in Rod's MCR01, my RV-12 or an IFR certified Tecnam P2006T twin.
I strongly disagree: the future powerplant for GA are diesel engines. I agree, Rotax is good for smaller (two-seat) aircraft, but for training/touring four-seaters, diesel engines are the way to go. With diesel engines, all the problems with fuel availability goes away (virtually everywhere in the world you can get Jet A-1), no problems with fuel temperatures (I don't have any specific experience, but I believe there are problems with Mogas above 30°C), timed injection (especially with CR where you have multiple injections in one cycle), much higher compression ratios (and thus engine efficiency), very efficient at cruise power (they all run LOP at normal load) water cooling, ... Add to that, perhaps the most important factor: technology has proven itself on many different IFR certified aircraft (C172, DA40, DA42, C206, ...), while Tecnam P2006T is the first "serious" (IFR mission capable) aircraft, powered by Rotax engine and so far we can't make any judgements yet.
The problem with aircraft piston engines are - as IO540 says - no development, we still have newly developed engines with carburetors, which have catastrophic air-fuel mixture ratios between cylinders (sadly even many injected engines with factory-made injectors don't offer much improvement), and I could go on and on and on about it. I think aviation industry should look to engines used in todays cars, you see technology as: variable valve timing, electronically controlled ignition, accurate piezo-injectors, 4 valves per cylinder, etc. Looking at this, it almost seems as if we were flying aircraft made in Stone Age
