When talking about cars, horsepower and torque are the two words that we discuss a lot. These are the vital parts of any specification sheet. But most of us don’t actually know what these terms and the numbers represent. A YouTube Channel, Engineering Explained, run by Jason Fenske put together a simple video demonstration to explain the meaning of ‘horsepower’ and ‘torque’, what does their value represents and how they relate to each other.
Torque is a force that acts on something from some distance, for example, a piston pushing down on a crankshaft and using that power to rotate it. However, horsepower is the product of torque with RPM. It is basically a measurement of how quickly an engine can perform a certain amount of work.
When it comes to measuring things like top speed and acceleration of a car, horsepower is the value that is taken into consideration. The value of horsepower explains how much an engine can accomplish in a certain time period.
That is just a basic explanation of the two terminologies. Have a look at this video by Feske to know how the things are actually happening inside your car’s engine and the difference between torque and horsepower in detail.
