Awesome Hydraulic Press

The Hydraulic Press Channel loves to subject things to the force of its 150-ton press. Here’s a compilation of some of the strongest, most dangerous, and most satisfying crushes over the years. It’s also a great demonstration of the varying strengths of different metals.

A viewer wrote to the Hydraulic Press Channel with the hypothetical question of whether it would be possible to compress loose ash with enough force that it would turn into a rock. Naturally, they complied and dumped a bucket of moistened ash into a cylinder to see what would happen under the pressure of their 150-ton press.

You could make a Skittles-flavored donut by sprinkling some of the chewy candies on a glazed Krispy Kreme, but the guys at the Hydraulic Press Channel prefer to make donuts with industrial equipment. Using a custom-machined tool, they squish some M&Ms and Skittles into toroid shapes. They look like giant Life Savers.

The guys at the Hydraulic Press Channel are always on the lookout for things that hold onto so much energy before failing that they explode catastrophically. Paper does the trick quite well, and now we see that solid glass spheres have similar explosive potential.

The Hydraulic Press Channel usually shows how machines can be used to destroy stuff. But in this video, they take us inside Componenta, where such equipment is used to create things. Watch as a molten pillar of steel is loaded into a duo of presses, which gradually shape it into a ring that will be used to make a giant gear.

You’d think you’d need to own a hydraulic press to do stuff like the guys at the Hydraulic Press Channel do, but Aussie actor-dancer-comedian Smac McCreanor figured she could do the same without one. Instead of smushing objects, she uses her body to accurately reenact the crushing power of a 150-ton press.

If you really wanted to turn a Subway sandwich into a smoothie, you just need a blender and a little bit of water. But the Hydraulic Press Channel marches to the beat of a different drummer and prefers to mush up their footlongs with a 150-ton press and their Smoothie Maker 1,000,000, which might need a little work.

Industrial hydraulic presses are designed to compress metals, so we’re not surprised that HPC’s 150-ton press was able to make quick work of these steel axes. Place your bets now as to how much pressure will be needed to bend or break these normally sturdy hand tools.

Here’s a hydraulic press video that’s not from the Hydraulic Press Channel. The clip, recorded in an unnamed metal shop shows how oxidization in the outer layer of steel results in a spectacular show of sparks as small amounts of the metal are shed under compression.

Bridges can vary wildly in terms of strength depending on their structural design. The guys from the Hydraulic Press Channel welded together several miniature bridges from steel, then measured the force applied to each one to see which style is the strongest.

The guys at the Hydraulic Press Channel have been causing paper to explode under pressure for quite some time now. In this clip they attempt to measure just how much force a stack of paper can endure before failing spectacularly.

While it’s far from a comprehensive test, and they only tested for compressive strength, it’s still fun to see what happens to different types of tree trunks when they’re crushed in a powerful hydraulic press. Which kind of wood do you think will be the most durable?

A hydraulic press makes quick work of small metal nuts, smushing them handily with about 7000 lb of force. But can the mighty press defeat these giant, industrial-sized nuts that can barely fit in your hand? Hit Play and find out.

The guys from the Hydraulic Press Channel and Beyond the Press Channel keep their promise for bigger and more impressive videos by attempting to launch a crappy car into the sky using more than 150 pounds of dynamite. At the same time, they kicked off the first mission of the unofficial Finnish space program.

The guys from the Hydraulic Press Channel got their hands on a new machine for their workshop. It uses a pair of conveyor belts and a set of powerful rollers to flatten objects. They’re still working out the kinks, but it clearly has destructive potential. It’s also one of the more satisfying ways to pop large bubble wrap.

We’re all feeling the stress lately, so it’s nice to have something to relax our brains. We turn once again to the Hydraulic Press Channel to help us release some tension, with a series of 65 different soft, squishy, crunchy, fragile, and bendy items meeting a satisfying end.

Lauri and Anni of Hydraulic Press Channel fame dropped by the X-ray laboratory at the University of Helsinki to see what objects look like when crushed in front of an X-ray camera. With the help of scientist Samuli Siltanen, they were able to capture some very unique images. We’d love to see some more complicated objects.

Over the years, the Hydraulic Press Channel has smushed all kinds of stuff in their powerful industrial machines. Rather than having to dig through their YouTube channel for all of the best bits, they’ve compiled their favorite moments of destruction into one video. So sit back, grab some popcorn, and enjoy the carnage.

The Hydraulic Press Channel took a momentary break from just smushing things for fun, and instead performed a bit of a physics experiment. By creating multiple 3D printed objects of the same weight and mass, but just different shapes, they were able to evaluate which shapes were the strongest of the bunch.

The Hydraulic Press Channel took advantage of the brief daylight in Finland to step outside of their workshop and play with another toy, lovingly known as the Smashinator 5,000,000. This pneumatic press is much faster than the one they typically use, and it makes quite the mess when it makes things explode.

Between steel, aluminum, copper, and brass, which one is strongest? The guys at the Hydraulic Press Channel decided to put each one to the test on their 150-ton press, with some pretty explosive results. We wonder what titanium or tungsten would do under the same forces.

If you crushed them down flat, just how many aluminum soda cans could you fit inside of a Pringles can? Well, the Hydraulic Press Channel is here to answer another question that nobody was asking, and used a special cylindrical tool to smush down as many cans as possible. It took them more than 2 hours to crush them all.

We already know that stacked paper is one of the most explosive things you can put under a hydraulic press. Now, let’s find out what kind of paper makes the biggest boom, as the Hydraulic Press Channel tests paperback books, playing cards, paper pulp, and more under the pressure of their 144-ton press.