https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjmXQNhKCks
If you're one of the many people out there who loves to wrench on your own vehicles, you'll find yourself in need of a jack stand more times than not. We certainly put lots of faith in these stands, considering they are holding up a multi-thousand pound vehicle while we crawl around underneath it, so I wouldn't exactly cheap out when purchasing one.
However, just how much pressure can these things actually stand? Well, the Hydraulic Press Channel on YouTube wanted to figure out the answer to that question, and they put together a pretty cool video with the results. On top of testing the breaking point of the jack stands, they also press a bottle jack and a scissor jack to see how they compare with the stress testing. Spoiler alert: One of these crushed jacks ends up going through the window, so I should probably mention that you shouldn't try this at home.
Starting with the traditional jack stands, the press lowers and puts some serious weight on them. It managed to record a max load pressure of 12,300 pounds before failing. If you add the safety pin, those results jump up to 18,600 pounds before failure. Following this, they move on to pressing the bottle jack, which held up to 27,500 pounds of pressure, or 12.5 tons. This bottle jack took the prize for handling the most weight. Finally, they moved on to the scissor jack, which didn't do nearly as well and collapsed after 9,200 pounds of pressure.
Out of all of them, I have to say I'm pretty impressed with how well the bottle jack held up. To finish things off, they use the hydraulic press to completely crush all of the jacks and stands. Even though the bottle jack practically exploded at this point, it was definitely interesting to watch. Now you can feel confident while you're laying underneath that heavy car on jack stands.