what is horsepower? how do you determine it? why is it called horsepower? can someone please just explain horsepower in general to me i’m so confused why doesn’t it have anything to do with horses? ):
In: Engineering
It’s a unit of power.
Power is work done over time.
Work is force exerted across a distance.
Force is the acceleration of a mass.
Acceleration is the change in velocity over time.
Velocity is the change in distance over time.
Generally, we use watts for power.
1 horsepower = 745.7 W = 550 ft*lbs/s
To put what we described earlier into math,
Watts = joules/second
= Newtons * meters/s
= kilograms * m/s^2 * m/s
= kg*m^(2)/s^3
A horsepower was defined as the average amount work a horse could do over the course of a day (note: work/time). When engines became a thing, it was useful to compare their output to something people knew, which was a horse.
If it took 2 horses all day to plow a field, a 20 horsepower tractor could plow 10 fields in a day.
A horse at its maximum can output about 15 horsepower, but it’s not sustainable over the course of a day, since the horse needs rest.
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