DP Horsepower

wny_pat wrote:

Nomadac wrote:
I once read or heard a guide of 1 HP for each 100 lbs. Gross Wt. of MH.

Well, then if you had a 130,000 gross load that would be 1300 HP. I've seen a little Cummins NHC 250 pull that load 3 to 4 times a week, Buffalo, NY to Detroit, MI via Ontario, side by side with the big boys running 425 Cats. And they did it week after week after week. And that was with 8 or 9 axles on the round, which uses up even more power.

But it is a nice formula for power to weight ratio. Those truckers just did not pay any attention to it!

And no one wants to follow those guys up the grades. They get away with it, because the midwest is flat. The hills are short enough they can get a running start and still not be going that slow by the time they reach the top. Over time, our memories get selective. When I was a kid, 3 times a week we drove a section of I90 in Ohio. I always remember how we hated to get caught behind a semi on even those small grades, because they could not hold speed. The cops used to sit at the bottom of those grades, so they could go after the truckers trying to get a running start on the grade. We saw it week in and week out. Ohio you would get nailed for 5 over. The truckers would try hit 65 at the bottom of the hill, and a half mile later at the top, they were in the low 50s.