I built a pneumatic can crusher, but I wasn't satisfied with with just crushing it, I wanted to flatten them. So I put it it on a lever, it has ~2.4 mechanical advantage. So it goes from ~160lbs from the cylinder to about 400lbs on the "squishy plate".
Unfortunately, I was a little too hardcore, after a few tests, it managed to bend the entire base. Once I can get a some thicker metal I will put it back together.
Why do this? Because I have a tiny furnace and a mountain of cans that I melt down and cast into random shit.
Well the cylinder has a stroke length of ~8 inches (it's a little less) it is 17 inches from the pivot point, the other arm is 6 inches from the pivot.
When the cylinder is fully extended, the crushing plate will move down about 3 inches which is greater than the width of most cans. (At least greater than all of the cans I have.)
It flattened cans sideways because I wanted to be able to put them through a shredder. It was very close to accomplishing that, if the base plate didn't bend to shit, I'm sure it would have worked.
Yes! But the crushinator is a big girl, mine couldn't hold a candle to that, so she squishes instead of crushes!