Has anyone ever considered manufacturing PETROL (I.e regular 95 octane UL petrol) engines for aeroplanes based on car technology? For example a 4 cylinder, liquid cooled, Audi 200 HP car engine mated to a CS prop and using FADEC?
I would have thought the thing would be pretty light and pretty reliable (due to umpteen millions ploughed into development). I'd also have thought that power to weight would be higher than a diesel and that economy would be much improved over the Old Skool engines? I presume a petrol in this fashion would run at similar RPMs to a diesel and so could be made to work?
One other plus side is that PETROL is freely available worldwide, whether it be Ivory Coast or England or Alert. If you could achieve a 25% increase in economy, plus a 30% lower fuel price then that would keep a lot of people happy.
Would there be any point in even trying to develop a new petrol engine? What are the potential pitfalls?