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America's Iron Giants - The World's Most Powerful Metalworkers

3 videos recommended on HN
YouTube
3 HN users recommended this documentary3 months2019–2024 score 3.5
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

HN commenters recommend it as an excellent introduction to massive forging presses, especially in threads about gigacasting and large manufacturing machines.

Machine Thinking tells the story of the Cold War Heavy Press Program, the giant forging presses that make parts for aircraft, missiles and turbines.

“I first learned about these presses several years ago from the YouTube channel Machine Thinking which is excellent and unfortunately infrequent.” (HN, 2024)

1 strong recommendations · 2 recommendations · 2 citations · Documentaries

5 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@rendall Aug 2024 Strongly recommends
on HN thread How to build a 50k ton forging press
I first learned about these presses several years ago from the YouTube channel Machine Thinking which is excellent and unfortunately infrequent. The linked video has some excellent footage of these beasts in action. "America's Iron Giants" [this video]
Excellent footage of giant forging presses in action.
@mvidal01 Feb 2023 Recommends
on HN thread The giant die casts reshaping car manufacturing
This youtube video seems related. [this video] This is the story of America's massive forging presses built during the cold war used to build America's most advanced machinery - the Heavy Press Program. Modern airplanes, missiles, helicopters, turbines - all have parts made on these giant machines! The Machine Thinking channel seems interesting.
History of Cold War forging presses behind advanced machinery.

Citations, criticism and jokes

@jbay808 Mar 2019 Cites it
on HN thread US to build six nuclear power plants in India
Those heavy presses themselves seem to be nation-state level engineering projects, so it's unlikely that anyone would build more of them than they absolutely need. [this video]
Covers America's giant forging presses.

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

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