Boiler horsepower has nothing to do with mechanical horsepower; it measures heat output. A 100 BHP boiler delivers about 3.35 million Btu per hour, enough to make roughly 3,450 pounds per hour of steam from and at 212 degrees F. Packaged firetube boilers are sold by BHP, while residential and many hot water boilers are rated in MBH instead.
We're short about 50 horse in January, either add a boiler or stop running both process kettles at once.
One boiler horsepower is roughly 10 kilowatts of output, a handy cross-check when specs come in metric.
Also heard as
- BHP
- horse
- boiler hp
Do not mix it up with
- MBH: MBH is thousands of Btu per hour; one boiler horsepower is about 33.5 MBH.
Related terms
MBH
Thousands of Btu per hour: the everyday unit for rating heating boilers, burners and heating loads.
Firetube boiler
A boiler in which hot combustion gases run through tubes that are surrounded by the water being heated.
EDR
Equivalent direct radiation: the square-foot rating of heating radiators, used to size steam boilers.