Horsepower to Metric Horsepower (hp to PS)
1 horsepower equals 1.013869665 metric horsepower (rounded).
How to convert horsepower to metric horsepower
To convert horsepower to metric horsepower, multiply the number of horsepower by 1.013869665. The factor is rounded to 10 significant digits. To go the other way, multiply metric horsepower by 0.9863200706 (rounded).
metric horsepower = horsepower × 1.013869665
Example: 10 horsepower = 10.13869665 metric horsepower.
Several different horsepower units exist. This site lists mechanical (745.7 W), metric (735.5 W) and electrical (746 W) horsepower separately.
About these units
Horsepower (hp)
The mechanical horsepower: 550 foot-pounds per second, about 745.7 watts. James Watt coined it to compare steam engines with draft horses.
Horsepower was a sales pitch before it was a unit. Late in the 18th century the Scottish engineer James Watt adopted the term to compare the output of steam engines with the draft horses they replaced. His 1782 experiments found that a brewery horse could produce 32,400 foot-pounds-force per minute, and in 1783 he and Matthew Boulton standardized the figure at 33,000 foot-pounds-force per minute. Customers could then be told how many horses an engine would replace.
That figure works out to 550 foot-pounds-force per second, or about 745.7 watts: the power needed to lift 550 pounds by one foot in one second. Several cousins exist, including metric horsepower and electrical horsepower, defined as exactly 746 W. Car ratings added more confusion. Early British taxable horsepower was a formula based on bore and cylinder count, not measured output, and American ratings before 1972 used SAE gross brake horsepower, measured without accessories. In the European Union, horsepower may be used only as a supplementary unit under Directive 80/181/EEC, in force from 1 January 2010.
1 horsepower = 745.6998716 watts (approximately).
Sources: Wikipedia: Horsepower; Wikipedia: Metric horsepower
Metric Horsepower (PS)
Exactly 735.49875 watts, the power to lift 75 kilograms by one meter in one second. Called PS, CV or pk and used for car engines in Europe and Asia.
Continental Europe built its own horsepower on kilograms and meters instead of pounds and feet. The metric horsepower, written PS from the German Pferdestarke, is the power needed to lift 75 kilograms by one meter in one second, or 75 kilogram-force meters per second. The German standard DIN 66036 gives its value as 735.49875 W, about 98.6 percent of the imperial horsepower. It goes by many local names, among them cv in Italian and Portuguese, pk in Dutch, ch in French and hk in Swedish, Danish and Norwegian.
It had a French predecessor in the poncelet, a 19th-century unit based on 100 kgf-m/s. In 1972 the European Economic Community replaced PS with the kilowatt as its official unit for power, yet car brochures in many countries still quote PS or its cousins alongside kilowatts. When comparing a European car with an American one, remember that the two horsepowers differ by about 1.4 percent.
1 metric horsepower = 735.49875 watts (exactly).
Sources: Wikipedia: Metric horsepower; Wikipedia: Horsepower
Related conversions
- Metric horsepower to horsepower (reverse)
- Horsepower to watts
- Horsepower to kilowatts
- Horsepower to megawatts
- Horsepower to gigawatts
- Horsepower to BTU per hour
- Horsepower to milliwatts
- Horsepower to electrical horsepower
- Horsepower to foot-pounds per second
- Horsepower to tons of refrigeration
- Horsepower to kilocalories per hour
- Horsepower to calories per second
- Horsepower to ergs per second
- Watts to metric horsepower
- Kilowatts to metric horsepower
- Megawatts to metric horsepower
- Gigawatts to metric horsepower
- BTU per hour to metric horsepower
See all power units.