Power To Weight Ratios
Power To Weight Ratios While many places online divide the power by the weight, in the 1960s at least one auto manufacturer used an internal standard of 1 horse to 10 pounds, so the more relatable ratio is actually weight to power. The problem with historic vehicles and the original advertised horsepower is that the Ford 292 engine with a two barrel carb was quoted as 93 HP in 1955, then in 1956 as 200 HP with the exact same carb. This was the year that auto manufacturers started using gross horsepower as a marketing ploy and no longer cared about the truth. Gross horsepower is measured with the engine out of the car, up on a test stand, with no accessories attached. Sometimes manufacturers would increase the quoted horsepower, or decrease the horsepower, or for arbitrary reasons make it match up to the weight of the vehicle. So the exact same engine would be quoted as 360 horsepower if the v...