What is Horsepower?

Question:

What is the horse power and how do I calculate?

Answer:

Horsepower is an English engineering unit. It is equal to 550 foot-pounds per second. For example if an automobile requires 100 pounds of force to keep it moving at a constant speed or 50 miles per hour, the rate at which work is done is 5000 mile-pounds per hour. To convert this to horsepower we first need to multiply by the number of feet per mile (5280) and divide by the number of seconds per hour(3600). This gives us 5000*5280/3600=7333 foot pounds per second. Then divide this number by 550 to get the actual horsepower. I get about 13.3 horsepower.