Erm... are there any conventional engines that weigh 1000 pounds to begin with? Even high end V8s aren't that heavy. I wonder what they mean by that.
"Researchers estimate the new model could shave almost 1,000 pounds off a car's weight currently taken up by conventional engine systems."
A somewhat different statement, though I still share your skepticism.
(http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Wave_Disk_Engine)
Still, even if we're talking about total savings for the car, 1000 pounds is a hell of a lot, and I'm not sure I buy it. For reference, that's 3x the weight of an average V6 (or some light V8s), so it would have to remove a lot and add nothing back.
I found an engine weight list here that seems to be legitimate:
On the other hand, I don't think this would apply to cars with 25 kilowatt engines - a 1958 VW beetle only weighed 1600 pounds [http://www.conceptcarz.com/vehicle/default.aspx?carID=10196&...]
I think they considered all these parts when calculating weight savings.
Hmmm.
Transmission often counts the differential, without which you can't very well turn corners. You're going to need a reverse gear at minimum and a big part of the point of a transmission is to let you keep the engine in an optimally efficient rev range, so I suspect it'll still gain one.
No radiator? Possible, but to productionise it it'll have to be able to run in both Siberian and Saharan conditions. They're both a regular part of manufacturer sign-off tests for road cars, that it can handle extreme cold with lots of short runs to stop it warming up properly and extreme heat with lots of long runs and soak tests to stop it cooling properly. Personally, I'd expect it'll gain a cooling system.
So, even if the gearbox, diff, radiator and all associated fluids weighed 1,000lbs (unlikely I think), I don't think they could gain their weight quota because I doubt they can really eliminate them.