Of things affecting boilers... and horses

Christian Egli_2

I've seen horses drink, it seems they like the water they're served and I would like to get a handle on how much water one horse might consume.

Very specifically, if you work a live horse for one whole hour, how much water will the horse then have to drink to replenish what was lost to evaporation and sweat. What would it be? one whole 5 gallon pail per hour? less, more?

I'm consumed with curiosity; I've been reading new boiler brochures I've just received, and you can guess where I'm going with this.

Thanks in advance for any knowledge.

rumn8r

As opposed to workng...

a DEAD horse?

Seems to me we've beat a few dead horses around here on occasion, but I've never seen anyone work one.

I have a brother (just one) who is an expert on horses, and has worked quite a few live ones. He used to be one of very few people willing to train Arabian horses. He speaks their langwidge. I'll aks him and see if he knows the answer.

I can tell you this much, horses do NOT like radiant floors and warm stalls. Got that first hand from a practicng vet.

Where ARE you headed with this Chris?

ME

rumn8r

A quick googling found the following....

LIVESTOCK AND RANGE
Water Consumption by Livestock
Water consumption increases with size, lactation, increasing dry matter intake and increasing temperature. Some general guides to water intake are as follows:

Water Consumption
(gallons per day)

Beef cattle 7-12 per head
Dairy cattle 10-16 per head
Horses 8-12 per head (20 to 25 for hot weather)
Swine 3-5 per head
Sheep & Goats 1-4 per head
Chickens 8-10 per 100 birds
Turkeys 10-15 per 100 birds

Extremely hot heat-stress weather could increase the high values another 20 to 30 percent.

ME

jp_2

warm stalls

i bet in hind sight that makes sense to you?

I give my dogs nice doghouses with clean hay and they will sleep in the snow. they do use the houses though.

'we' think we are helping animals by giving them warm places in the winter but nature took care that long before we came around.

Christian Egli_2

Pour me whatever he's having

Here's a picture of a work horse which made it out alive though my shiny knight in armor was pushed off his mount.

Thanks Mark, the 10-ish gallons of water per day per horse makes good sense, that number is in line with what we humans absorb in fluids throughout the day (proportionally to weight and body surface), but that number is not for live work, it's just for staying alive.

I sense the hot estimate of 20 to 25 gallons is when you include working under the hot sun, but how quickly does a horse work?

Obviously, even a work horse can't realistically labor the whole day. For hard work would two hours be a maximum number, then, after each of these two hours of hard work would it be fair to give the horse an extra 5 gallons to drink?, thus making up our 10 + 5 + 5 = 20 gallons consumption.

I'm making water disappear into thin air, see where I'm going now? Here is the question to be translated into horse langwidge.

Ideally, I'm looking for a horse that guzzles 4.3 gallons of water per hour under maximum work. Is that a fair number?

brucewo1b

Get a real Work Horse

Only 30 gallons a day

Work Horse

Uni R_2

Shires!!!

No no no... not those skinny clydes!

There's no topping a Shire. Nature's own Caterpillar tractor!

Christian Egli_2

OK, so 30 gallons of Budweiser it is

Thanks Bruce and Uni for the info.

If those horses are given 30 gallons of drink in exchange for approximately a seven hour work shift, 30 / 7 = 4.3 gallons per hour. This seems to be my sought after number.

Am I just fudging numbers or does all this seem unrealistic?

I didn't know they had dogs on those hitches to protect the horses and cargo while the drivers made deliveries. It makes a lot of sense and it's interesting how in other times crime problems were solved. But who'd ever go after a cargo of beer???

So, I have the Clydes at 4.3 GPH

How much of the Samuel Smith do the Grey Shires pump down?

Christian Egli_2

You're looking at their hinds? That's the dangerous end

JP, I have no idea why your dog wouldn't enjoy having warm paws, or why even radiant floor heat wouldn't behoove a horse.

All I can think of is perhaps to give it another try with a live radiator filled with steam.

I've been told cows love warm floors and cozy rubber beddings, but then again, a glass of hot milk is hard to resist. Hey, how many gallons are there in one udder?... oh heck, enough with my measurements...

rumn8r

Yah, Sure... I talked to my brother, the Horse Whisperer...

and his numbers were pretty close to yours. By the way, and if that really is your Knight Boiler parked on that horses, whatever, he said to make sure you walk the horse down before you water it, or it might get colicky on you.

He said between 3 and 4 gallons per hour.

And so your point is...?

ME

Perry_2

Its been obvious from the first post...

The question being determined is how many horsepower is his boiler... (if a Horse evaporates 4.3 gallons per hour - then a boiler that does the same has one horsepower).

This may be an interesting way to determine how accurate the older burner/boiler ratings of how many horsepower a boiler has.



Perry

Christian Egli_2

Cowpower birdpower elephantpower dogpower catpower... what?

Want to know why we can't measure boilers in cowpower? It's not because someone loved cows less than horses, not even because someone may not have found the cowpies they leave us all that impressive, nope, it's because horses can sweat just like us and so very very few other creatures.

When it's hot or when they're working dogs pant like a one pipe steam system in heat shock. Cats pant too, but they don't work. Birds and elephants flap their appendages for hot air, thus birdpower may be appropriate for measuring the output of a furnace. But horses, they steam away like an efficient boiler - perhaps that's why we're so close to them.

Thus, we pour the water in on one side and observe the steam output from the other. It works for boilers, it works for horses, and with cows you don't get steam, you just get hot milk.

You figured it out Perry, that's why we don't all have nuclear power plants named after us.

jp_2

it simple!

how comfortable are you in a parka,hat,boots and gloves sit next to a toasty warm fireplace with the house temp at 72F?

rumn8r

Gotcha...

I often wondered why they used the term horspower to describe boiler capacity.

ME

Christian Egli_2

Note the dints on the armor and my computations

Thanks Mark for following up on the horses' tab. 3 to 4 gallons per hour seems perfectly in line with what a shiny boiler will go through. It takes a lot of BTU to do all that.

Isn't it fun to try measuring up the output of a real live horse? Somehow, it's all making more and more sense. Plus, at any rate, horses are mighty impressive to watch and get near to.

I've not remained idle here, I've been talking horse all day.

Horses do put out work, but to keep them alive, you have to limit the activities. You can work them real hard for a very short amount of time, or operate them at a leisurely pace for about three hours in the morning and another three in the afternoon with a hefty lunch break in between. Plus, more than just watching a gauge on a dashboard, you have to be worried stiff about them catching a cold.

For instance, after a spasm of hard work, the horse will give off lots of smoke, evaporating steam to cool off. The thing is that steam being so incredibly effective in cooling hot fires, the next phase the horse goes through is a chill if you don't promptly cover it with a jacket. But at least the horse might be going through 4.3 gallons of water at that point, I asked, but no, just like you said, Mark if you dial in such a throughput, the horse will get a colic. A cold gallon in such circumstances pushes into the danger zone.

So what do horses do when it's hot? A cool Bud? No, not either, they're not stupid, they hide in the shade. Apparently horses give off smoke mostly when working. When idle even in the hot summer, they only require very little water; depending on how juicy their diet is, an additional few gallons is enough. Horses don't pee like cows either. Isn't all this fascinating?

Next, I hoped that at least perhaps horses might sloppily spill the 4.3 gallons per hour while wetting their lips, but no, a horse having a spot of water is a dainty affair: pursed lips, a delicate sip, a little swirl, and the final swallowing. If you're thinking dog, cat or cow, you're wrong.

So how does all this compare to a boiler? I'm not sure yet, but I was told horses hate the comfort of central warming, they never seek to cozy up their stall like homely cows do. And if you attempt to make them sleep with a radiator, they'll catch a cold, get gravely sick and die, just as quick as you can fiddle the thermostat.

Horses are most comfortable at 45F, it's ok for their poops to freeze on the floor, and if humans work them and make them sweat (which they would avoid doing on their own) then, the careful wearing of blankets and jackets does the trick for thermal comfort. Just like a boiler, a small layer of insulation as a jacket keeps them healthy.

There, that was my little road trip.

Does all this info seem true to other observers? I've never cared after a horse and I have no idea, I just know to worry when the ears go low, that's when the safety valve is about to blow.

Christian Egli_2

That's a 2 horse power cart

Now when you start attaching heavy things to horses and make them run you can measure horsepower output. Say things that weigh, 180 lbs and you get traction at 60 yards per minute, (or if your horse is metric, then find 75 kg to lift at 1 meter per second) you get the standard horsepower we all talk about in car engines.

Thanks Mark

Giddyup yaaa

Perry_2

I still waiting to get Royalty Payments from that Nuclear Unit

I assume that you are in the Ohio area?

I guess it's a good thing I don't actually work their. Talk about the confusion...

Perry

jp_2

don't see connection?

first off I hope we all agree what you see in the pictures isn't "steam' coming off the horses. maybe water vapor but not steam.

neither do we breath out steam in the winter, sure does 'look' like steam, but not steam.

I see the water as a catalyst, it goes right through, providing lubricant, lactic acid removal, drives matablism, removes waste, carries energy to muscles... and so forth.

does a horse always drink just whats been displaced?

if you want to know the 'work done' by the horse, gotta look at the energy consumed, weight of the horse before and after, add those so many gallons of water heated to horses body temp. theres the engery expended.

I don't by the part that dogs don't work either. in a long distance dog sled race the team may cover 100 miles a day, pulling a 150lb driver(at least) and a 200lbs sled. can a horse team do 100 miles a day?

so i don't see connection between a horse and a steam boiler.

bob_46

Energy

An old fitter I used to work with was very flatulent. He used to walk around muttering all day:"A fartin horse will never tire, a fartin man's the man to hire". When I was a kid my Dad had an old mule that he was experimenting with. He was trying to make it as energy efficient as possible. His idea was to recycle the fuel. He gradually increased the recycleables in the mules diet. Just about when he reached 100% efficiency that damned old mule up and died on him. Never did find out if it was possible. bob

Christian Egli_2

Horses are fascinating and so are boilers

It's just tough to choose one over the other and since horses have managed to once be the most economically influential animal we've ever domesticated, it naturally follows that we measure up everything against them.

Trucks, cars, electric motors are all measured in hp, horsepower, which are translatable: there is 736 W per hp. (there are other slightly off conversion factors too, something to be very careful of)

And...

Steam boilers, most often the larger ones, are measured in BHP, boiler horsepower, again translatable: there is nearly 10 kW per BHP.

There is a bunch of explanations, all a bit different, about how those numbers came alive with many assumptions as to what was high tech in the years 18xx. What's obvious though is that there is a horse behind it all, and I want to know all about that horse.

Horses, like any engine or motor, consume energy and produce heat and work and... waste. It's the stuff of thermodynamics.

Hey, JP, thanks for pointing out where I mixed up my cats and dogs. I only wanted to mean that cats don't work, you'll agree to that I'll go back and chop up that sentence in an edit. Thanks for reading.

Anyone else with more data on the drinking habits of horses?

Christian Egli_2

And some modern appliances boast 110% efficiency

Ohh, that's not quite the info I was after. Bob, I don't know what to say, sorry about the mule but thanks for the story all the same.

brucewo1b

Anyone else with more data on the drinking habits of horses?

Keep them out of bars they tend to draw barflies.

jp_2

horses boilers engines

it sure helps to have standards so that thing can be equated across the playing field.

we'd be lost if steam engines, diesel engines,gas engines and horses all had different ways of measuring output that couldn't be converted one from the other

scott w.

drinking horses

horse of a different color.

In the 1840's there used to be two competing stage coach lines that ran from western Maryland to western Pennsylvania. The two men who owned the lines, Lucious Stockton and Pete Burdine
were very competitive men who were always competing with each other for the fastest time between the towns. It was noted in the history books of the old pike that Lucious used to put a bit of whiskey in the horses water and he usually had the fastest time. Old Pete used to say, "Buy a ticket on the Stockton line and you'll be sure to be passed by Pete Burdine".
(this has been a history moment)

Scott Denny

Info on horse water consumption

I'll bet the "dead men" have the answers you're looking for. Go to any large metro library and look for US Cavalry manuals. The Army has always had a penchant for measuring, quantifing and regulating. It appears to me that power is measured in horse power because horses have been western mans' primary beast of burden for at least 3 millenniums. I guess if we hailed from the sub-continent we'd be talking elephant power, or how about yak, oxen or llama power?

Scott Denny

I took my own advice

Here's what I found from an on line search of the San Francisco public library
Animal transport / prepared under direction of Chief of Cavalry.
Publication Info. Washington, D.C. : U.S. G.P.O., 1939.

If SF's got it, I'll bet your closest metro libery has it or something very close to it.
Good Luck, Christrian.
May the Swartz be with you.
Scott