Louis Jourdan wrote in USMA 21166: >At 11:34 -0400 16/07/2002, Joseph B. Reid wrote: >>I suspect that the French car manuals use the "cheval vapeur" or "CV". It >>is defined as 75 metre kilogram-force = 735.50 W = 0,986 32 horsepower. > >Not really. In fact in most European countries car engines power is >given in two units: kW and "CV DIN", commonly called (in French) >"chevaux DIN". DIN stands for "Deutsches Institut f�r Normung" and is >the German Bureau of Standards who defined the CV DIN or HP DIN as >0.735 kW. > >>There is, or was, also the "cheval vapeur fiscal" which seemed to bear no >>relation to CV. > >There has been an "administrative power" in many countries, used as >a basis for taxes, and more or less related to actual power. For >instance in the early 19th century in UK, a car had an administrative >power equal to 0.1 liter of displacement (yes, it was metric!). > >But true, France had developed very sophisticated formulas to >establish the "fiscal power", this one for example used until 1998: > >P = m (0.0458 C/K)^1.48 > >where m = 1 for gas driven engines and 0.7 for diesel engines > C = displacement in cubic centimeters > K = average of speeds in km/h at 1000 rpm for the different >gear ratios (sorry, rpm, not Hz!) > >One immediately sees how the formula was ridiculous: the sport >version of a model, with a 5 or 6-speed gear box, had a fiscal power >lower than the basic version with 3 or 4 speeds, and paid less taxes >and a lower insurance premium (which used to be based on the fiscal >power)! > >The present formula is: > >P = (CO2/45) + (P/40) where CO2 = CO2 emissions in g/km and P = power in kW. > >Incidentally there is no longer any tax on cars (but the registration >tax, only once) and insurance premiums are based on actual power and >cost of the car. > >Louis
Thanks, Louis, for bringing my information up to date. I had no idea that the subject is that complicated. Joe Joseph B.Reid 17 Glebe Road West Toronto M5P 1C8 Tel. 416 486-6071
