eli5: Can horsepower be added to each other or is there overlap? Example: If Ferrari says that an electric motor on each front wheel can produce 100hp each, and the combustion engine produces 750hp. Is it actually 950hp exactly? Or is there overlap or less hp etc?

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Answer 1

Sometimes it doesn’t add up. For example, the combustion engine will have max hp at 5500 rpm and electric motor will also have max hp around 5500 rpm. Except the combustion engine will have max rpm around 7000 and the electric motor will have max rpm around 12000. So the two motors will be geared different. And they probably won’t both hit max power at the exact same time. So probably electric motor will hit peak power first and then start dropping off by the time combustion motor hits peak power.

It should be noted that there are no laws regarding how power is reported, so some companies may just be adding them up. New standard SAE J2908 will make rules on how to report power, and it must be measured at the wheels.

https://www.motortrend.com/news/sae-j2908-ev-plug-in-hybrid-horsepower-rating-standard/