Difference between mapping a piston and rotary

[gonzoninja]

Without getting too technical I just would like to know what the difference is between mapping a piston and rotary engine.

There are a lot of posts saying only take your rx7 to a rotary tuner, but why. What areas of the map need speical attention that someone who is used to doing pistons won\'t do? Is it just a case of rotaries needing to run richer?

Just curious is all...

[Jit]

err...run it too lean once and youre engines knackered with a rotary! A lot of tuners ive seen start off slightly lean for a piston car and then quickly ramp up the fuel...do this on a rotary at your peril!! Also, got to run slightly richer AFRs anyhow....

[Red and Single]

leading and trailing spark plugs must lead to incerdibly differing timing charactistics to a boinger too...

[Carl]

Due to the long thin combustion chamber of a rotary not being an ideal shape the rotary is much more susceptible to detontion when the timing is out or the engine is too lean.
Rotaries do need to be tuned a bit on the rich side when compared to piston engines.
Also the fact that there are two spark plugs per chamber that fire at different times in the power cycle has quite a bearing on tuning.
Regards
Carl