Horsepower hours per gallon- help me understand

[Robert_in_NY]

making light of my FIL without knowing his history, without knowing your history either, just that you make estimates for a GC.

for all any of us know your employer might build sheds for peoples back yards.... seeing as you are employed by someone else and my FIL does live by his wits and has been self employed for many years, be careful what you compare your portion of the construction trade to.

My point was my SIL also has a GC license,, and she aint the sharpest chisel in the toolbox.


So you type of guys kill me....... you guys are the experts at everything and nobody else knows anything..... participating on many boards allows me to see a common type of behavior on all these forums...... namely one guy who knows something and his followers who tend to agree with anything he says...... but if someone who takes a contrary opinion and doesn't back away from it or go away this someone gets called names, taken to task and shouted down by the camp followers.....

someone asked what this had to do with fuel use, answer this doesn't have anything to do with fuel use. just the thread starter wanted to estimate fuel use and now we are off on a tangent over whether someone can be within 2% or not on an estimate...

depends on what your estimating..... intangibles abound in farming, apparently construction work is simpler and you can know exactly how much it will cost,within 2%, right down to the last tube of caulk. LOL.

So is it Bill (Farmwithjunk) or me that knows something. Personally I think its me but Bill thinks it is him. But I haven't sold all my blue tractors for red ones and he hasn't sold his red ones for blue so neither of us are following the other yet.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

The fact you don't know enough to realize you're wrong isn't the fault of "the camp followers" ( who happens to be a contracor also).

So your calling me a follower too

I need to change jobs so I can get a brain of my own

 

[Farmwithjunk]

So your calling me a follower too

I need to change jobs so I can get a brain of my own

Note the "quotation marks" around "camp followers". Obviously Skippy, er Kicky, er whatever his name is seems to think anyone who contradicts his agenda is a "follower". I only noticed one person in this thread that's in need of change. Betcha can't guess who that is?????

 

[Farmwithjunk]

So is it Bill (Farmwithjunk) or me that knows something. Personally I think its me but Bill thinks it is him. But I haven't sold all my blue tractors for red ones and he hasn't sold his red ones for blue so neither of us are following the other yet.

And for the record, anything I own is for sale. Prices are a little higher on some things than others, but they're still for sale.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

And for the record, anything I own is for sale. Prices are a little higher on some things than others, but they're still for sale.

Are you looking for some blue tractors

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Note the "quotation marks" around "camp followers". Obviously Skippy, er Kicky, er whatever his name is seems to think anyone who contradicts his agenda is a "follower". I only noticed one person in this thread that's in need of change. Betcha can't guess who that is?????

I knew what you meant, I was just having fun this morning

 

[gemini5362]

Well I am not a GC most people that know me would not call me a camp follower so I hopefully am not going to fall in those categories. I agree that you have to know what something is going to cost when you start building or you are going to have some really big problems. I also find it hard to believe that you can estimate the cost down to the penny of a project as big as you talk about when the project is going to be months or even years before it is finished. I would imagine if you are coming in over budget or even under budget you are using worst case scenarios in your numbers that you use to figure the original budget. As a matter of fact if you have such a perfect budget how did you come in under it ? The rising cost of fuel would be a variable. It is going to affect the prices you pay for everything. I am assuming that you lock in prices by contract before you start building but if you do that then the person you are contracting with is using worst case numbers to figure their budget. I believe that someone that uses values that parralel previous costs and then adds a percentage for any unexpected costs is not an idiot and is just using alternative buisness methods. I believe if you read Sam Waltons biography he said that he just pulled a number out of the air and decided that he would keep his overhead below that number. I dont think that using a number that he pulled out of the air as part of his budget has hurt him any.


I am a little uncomfortable with the name calling in this thread. I have noticed in the past that usually brings someone in to lock down the thread and start deleting posts. I have been caught up in that myself and had a nice little well deserved note about what this forum is about and name calling was not a part of it. Maybe we can disagree without getting personal about it.

 

[zzvyb6]

If I can try to steer this train back on track, how does this sound:

1 gal of Diesel is reported to be about 138,700 Btu/gal. Yes, you can argue this a few percent depending on #1,#2, color, additives, even how big is your gallon.

If 1.0 HP is equivalent to 2545. Btu/hr., then that is equivalent to 54 hr/gal or .01834895yadayada gal/hr/hp. This would be for a 100% conversion efficiency (not likely).

so if we assumed a 33% efficiency for conversion, a tractor producing and dispersing 40HP would be sucking down about 2 gal/hr.

So the biggest factor to consider is the conversion efficieny of your motor and the amount of power you need to run the implement and move the machinery.

Now throttle factors play into the efficiency number. A motor running with the throttle plate closed is less efficient than running with throttle wide open.

This means that you should only have a motor with rated power appropriate to do your job. A 200hp tractor running a 4' finish mower ain't what I'd call an efficient conversion, unless you can run at 30 mph to keep the motor working at 'full throttle'.

Some of you geeky guys ought to be able to compute your machinery efficiency by reading radiator and exhaust temperatures. A 'good' motor throws 1/3 of input energy out the radiator, 1/3 out the exhaust stack and 1/3 out the prop shaft. I'll bet the rest of the debate in this thread can now be about whose motor is most efficient. This would be compression, valve sizing, injector nozzle pattern, piston area, number of cylinders and accessory drive hp suckage (alternator, water pump, fan, valve train, oil viscosity, power steering, and hydraulic supply pump rating).

 

[Farmwithjunk]

Well I am not a GC most people that know me would not call me a camp follower so I hopefully am not going to fall in those categories. I agree that you have to know what something is going to cost when you start building or you are going to have some really big problems. I also find it hard to believe that you can estimate the cost down to the penny of a project as big as you talk about when the project is going to be months or even years before it is finished. I would imagine if you are coming in over budget or even under budget you are using worst case scenarios in your numbers that you use to figure the original budget. As a matter of fact if you have such a perfect budget how did you come in under it ?

I never claimed that our bids were "perfect". They are CONSISTANTLY reliable and accurate with-in an accepted percentage. We aim for 2% IN MOST CASES. Some jobs require more of a cushion.

We factor in "contingency expenses". Years of experience and constant evaluation of previous jobs allow us to have a good handle on estimating those numbers. In the case of the hospital project, we had a substancial savings on fuel/energy cost after fuel prices didn't rise as fast as we anticipated. That alone accounted for nearly 70% of our budget savings.

We've been blind-sided on a few occasions. Rising steel prices have been our un-doing on a couple occasions. Poorly written job specs due to an inexperienced engineering firm was our biggest hit in recent years.

A GOOD general contractor will manage the job with an eye towards the budget. If a certain aspect of the job starts to go over, the GC has to tighten his belt elsewhere to take up the slack. That's the only way to stay competitive AND stay profitable.

 

[gemini5362]

I never claimed that our bids were "perfect". They are CONSISTANTLY reliable and accurate with-in an accepted percentage. We aim for 2% IN MOST CASES. Some jobs require more of a cushion.

We factor in "contingency expenses". Years of experience and constant evaluation of previous jobs allow us to have a good handle on estimating those numbers. In the case of the hospital project, we had a substancial savings on fuel/energy cost after fuel prices didn't rise as fast as we anticipated. That alone accounted for nearly 70% of our budget savings.

We've been blind-sided on a few occasions. Rising steel prices have been our un-doing on a couple occasions. Poorly written job specs due to an inexperienced engineering firm was our biggest hit in recent years.

A GOOD general contractor will manage the job with an eye towards the budget. If a certain aspect of the job starts to go over, the GC has to tighten his belt elsewhere to take up the slack. That's the only way to stay competitive AND stay profitable.

That is what i kind of figured you were saying. The difference I see between what you are saying and the other poster is that you figure your expenses with consistencies that are specific to your experience and the office personnel you have available for specific instances. The other poster seems to be more of a mom and pop operation ( nothing derogatory intended) and they seem to feel that they use todays estimated numbers and add a generic percentage for contingencies. Both methods seem to work for both of you since from the posts I am reading both companies seem to be profitable and providing jobs for others.