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“Horsepower is a measurement used to calculate how fast force is produced from an engine of a vehicle and focuses on how quickly it can accomplish the work. ”
The term “horsepower” was a unit of measurement created by James Watt in the mid-17th century to assess how quickly ponies could haul coal out of a coal mine. This experiment was done as a campaign to compare the power created by horses that were used to pull heavy items back in the day versus his new invention, the steam engine. Based on his theory, James Watt found if a single horse applied 1 horsepower, it was able to raise 330 pounds of coal 100 feet per minute which was equivalent to 330 pounds of coal 100 feet per minute, or 1,000 pounds of coal 33 feet per minute. In short, Watt concluded a horse can do 33,000 foot-pounds of work per minute which was how a single unit of horsepower was contrived.
Although horsepower was founded in the mid-17th century and came to be 33,000 foot-pounds of work per minute, in modern-day, we now translate that to a horse having the ability to lift 550 pounds 1 foot high per second. The latter being the standard James Watt decided on since horses differ in power.
Horsepower is one of the key measurements related to engine power. However, it is not to be without its counterpart, torque. Both are frequently used when describing the engine and ability of a car but are used to measure engine power in different ways.