horsepower
 

hi guys this is my first post on here i need to know how much horsepower is required to pull along carriages with people on them i am going to use a electric motor:D

I'm not a physics expert nor do I pretend to be one, however the horsepower needed to pull a carraige is directly proportional to the weight of the carraige and anything on or in it, in addition to the weight of the motor itself and any vehicle on which it is mounted, unless the motor is to remain stationary, taking into account any gradients.

For example, a motor designed to pull a 20ton carraige with 3tons of additional weight (passengers/freight), may not be sufficient to pull a 25ton carraige.

Equally, a motor designed to pull a 25ton carraige on a flat gradient may not be able to pull a 20ton carraige uphill.

So to put it in lamens terms....... How long is a piece of string?

Eeeeek this is one of those subjects which sound dead easy until you start doing the maths. I would imagine that what you're really after is Drawbar Pull....since you're trying to pull vehicles along.

Just as with HHF above I'm purely a layman, but I've sat in Traction classes and my eyes have glazed over just like everbody else's.

To see how lairy this can get, follow this link...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsepo...nt_definitions

Erm.....yeah I got lost after 'horsepower (hp)....' :lol: but I'm sure that about describes it!!!!

Oh I forgot to say as well as gradients you have to take into account friction variables of the ground/track.

EDIT: Hi btw, welcome to the forum.

ok then i am thinking of 3 carriages with 3 full size adults on each carriage probably weighing 100kg each

ok guys i need to know how much horsepower i need to tow a ton on the train:eek:

To try and answer your question:- Do you think one horse could pull along your train? I reckon so. So a one horsepower motor will pull it along at 2 mph. Your problem is not in the motor, but in the gearbox. If you gan only get a 5 hp motor, juggle the gear assembly to get the right balance between speed and power. How much reserve power do you want to keep in hand?

Then there are different types of motors. Some are good at starting off under fine control at low speeds, others are only desiged to run at high speed through a gearbox. Some will run continuosly without overheating, others wont.

You have really have a Junkyard Challenge to see what motors you can get hold of from wheelchairs, or washing machines, or factory machines (lathe??) and then adapting what you have got to your problem

Hope you are going to run on 12V car batteries and not on 415V three phase a.c. :D

The second part of your problem will be how heavy the "tow-car" needs to be. Even if you have enough power, the wheels can slip on the rails and you will go nowhere.