DIYbanter - View Single Post - Small Motor Seasonal Starting Saga Solved?

jim

wrote:

Briggs took what for 50 years they called a 3.5 horsepower and simply
lied and labeled it as a 5 or 6 horsepower. Then when they got caught
they didn't want their fraud to be widely known so they came up with a
story that horsepower is a lousy way to rate engines and torque is a
much better way to rate small engines.
From what I've read / heard, you are blowing more smoke than a 15
year old Briggs.

If your 15 year old briggs blows smoke its probably from bad
maintenance.

Yes, the manufacturers were sued - but they were not NECESSARILY
deceptive in their ratings.

The US federal court doesn't agree with you. It was deceptive
advertising

The engines WERE rated at a given stated
RPM - and if run at that RPM with the torque ratings currently on the
engines they WOULD produce (in most cases) the advertized horsepower.

So how did a 3.5 horsepower engine get turned into a 6 hp engine?

Your claiming they did it by making it run slower
which is nonsense.
They did it by slapping a 6 hp label on it.

If you take the torque available at whatever RPM the engine is run at
and multiply the two, then devide by 5252, you get the horsepower.

Look at the Torque rating of any engine out there today, and multiply
it by 3600, then devide by 5252, and you will find the result is
extremely close to the HP the engine was formerly advertized/sold
with.

That mumbo mumbo doesn't explain how they turned a 3.5 engine into a 6
hp when the only real difference was a fancy plastic shroud on the
exterior.

And yes the current torque ratings are accurate, but you can't compare
to what the engine used to be rated at, because they didn't give torque
ratings before.

Horse power ratings are now required to be done by dyno testing random
engines off the assembly line. They can't just do some silly
calculations and call it a 6 hp engine. Briggs won't tell you what the
current hp rating is.