Designed and built my own homegym, including weights, J-hooks, safety's and dippingbar. 

Oct 13, 2021 11:36 AM

duckie8788888

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Finished product. Designed and build/welded/clear coated by myself.
Totals around 153 cm deep (little over 5 feet)
Plate storage part is 60 cm deep (little less than 2 feet)
Workout area is 90 cm between uprights (little less than 3 feet)
225 cm high (7'4)
105 cm between uprights (3'5)
Made most of it bolt together, so I rearrange and upgrade later on.

I'm a professional metalworker, so the building of it wasn't very hard. Modeling all the parts in SolidWorks as a modeling rookie did take some time and effort though. Decided to make up my own logo (sitting bear) as to give it a personal touch.

Went for 70x70x3mm square tubing. 5 mm connecting flanges and feet. 20,5 mm holes, spaced 50 mm c.t.c. Made two set of J-hooks the blue sets distance between the mounting peg and where the bar rests is 25 mm greater than the red set. Giving the option to adjust in 25 mm increments. Mounting hardware is M20.

Laser cut most of the parts myself. J-hooks are made out of 5 mm plate with 10 mm Polyethylene lining. Bend the hooks myself, TIG welded on the supports to sandwich two 12,5 mm Polyethylene hooks.

Made out of two plate parts. Cut slots in the part that folds around the upright. Designed corresponding protrusions on the part with the bear cutout, so I could plug weld the backside. Cut out a hole for the 20 mm steel rod so I could weld that on both sides also.

Outsourced the tube laser work as we don't have a tube laser at work. Laser cut all the other flat material myself. The numbers in the uprights were a bit of a nightmare to model. After a quote from the tube laser people, I decided to reduce the amount of number cutouts in the front uprights. The middle uprights have a number each hole the front only has one every other hole.

5 mm braces and a 5 mm backplate, cut and bend to perfectly fit between the uprights. Got an ATX Rambar as a gift from my girlfriend. Great bar good grip, but the sleeve have ridges that make more noise than I would like when sliding on the plates. Might turn them down 0,5 mm in the lathe sometime.

Laser cut my own plates. Decided to make a 5KG logo plates. Put he off center so he sits nicely. The slight off balance in the plates is no problem for me. I primarily train the power lifts so no rapid movements where such a small off balance maters. Maybe went a little overboard with the logo's.

Bend me up a tube to make a dipping bar. I'm not that wide, so I made the tube come out way narrower than the commercially available dipping bars. Much more comfortable for me this way.

Drilled out the square tubing. Cut a few relieves in the inside of the square tubing and the beat the flaps around the round tubing, as to optimize the weld length. TIG welded the whole thing together. Solid as can be.

Rotate 45 degrees and slide in and out. there is a 20 mm pin slightly of center (so it will hang straight on its on) around the 24th hole. Lined al the parts that come in contact with the upright with some 4 mm rubber.

Hand stitched safety straps. Strap is some sort of seatbelt material and could hold up to 2500KG. 8 mm strip with a slight bends in it so goes from the 70 mm tubing to the 48mm strap. Made some 20 mm pins and plug welded on a logo cutout.

In the loop of the strap is a 50 mm piece of round tubing. For the bolt to clamp onto. When tightened the ears that go around the square tubing will sit just a little wider than the tube, so it's easy to adjust.

Load tested my hand stitching skills, stack weights 550KG did some jiggling with it. No problem.

750 KG started hearing some slight popping sounds. Called it good enough. On the stack you can see the other stitching design I tried. Looked worse and was a little weaker, so I went with the square with dash design.

Laser cut my own plate parts. Made 4 x 1,25KG plates. 2 x 5KG, 2X 10KG and 6 x 20KG plates. I don't deadlift heavy at home and suck at squatting. But I might have to upgrade soon

With the help of some software, I got pretty close to the goal weight. 15 mm plate.

After hear the noise the plates made when sliding on the barbell, I decide to incorporate a sliding bushing. Milled out the holes slightly with a boring head to accommodate the bushing. 0.12% of, still not bad though.

10mm plate. TIG welded on 8 mm handles and the 5 mm weight numbers. Decided to let the bushing stick out a little (less than aforementioned 8 mm) to help with the stability when hanging. It also serves as a standoff when loading plates in front of it. 1% off could be better.

15mm 20KG plates.

Made 8 bolt on weight pegs.

Shot of the backside of the backplate. All holes lined up perfectly. Backplate is secured with 8 x M20 bolts.

Might do some sort of lighting behind the backplate?

Made my own bench. Competition spec. 60 mm thick firm foam.

Upholstered the seat myself with some textured vinyl I think. Came out ok.

Some wheels and a third foot so you can stand it up and store.

Used the same 4 mm rubber as I did for the dip bar. Works great.

Polished logo cutout. Brazed on laser cut handle. The whole thing took about half a year. Mostly due to the designing aspect. The tube laser work was about €1400 and all the other stuff (plates, bench and accessories) ran me about €650. Next up, is some sort of cable attachment I think.

This is really impressive @OP both in the design and the execution.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

From someone who spent a lot of time recovering from a back injury - you'll thank yourself if you face the weight pegs outward.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Telspar not a good fit for the perf tube?

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

This is some pro tier work. I dont know even the first thing about welding or metal work but even i can tell this is high quality.

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Just FYI, apostrophe isn't used to pluralize a word. The plural of "safety" is "safeties"

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

When the welds are wrapped and the corner joints are ground smooth

4 years ago | Likes 38 Dislikes 0

Bumper plates bro. Looks amazing tho.

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

ever thought about making more on the side and selling them. Cause I'd buy some of that!

4 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

This is absolutely beautiful. Great work! Get to making a belt squat attachment to save your back.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Amazing.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

"Exercise machine"? No, the Birdiciser 4000 is a breakthrough in low-budget improvised personal training solutions.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I understand that reference! But... It's got bears all over it, wunnit be the beariciser?

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

The sitting bear reminds me of "there is now a level zero", but THIS is definitely a level 10/10! It's gorgeous and functional. Jealous.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I came here thinking, "who is this asshole and what kind of junk did he build"...I was wrong. Great work, duckie.

4 years ago | Likes 178 Dislikes 0

First comment on my lips was to say,"Did you rate taht steel scaffold for that weight..." yes, yes he did.

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

That's beautiful.

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I was expecting a more delicious dipping bar :'(

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Amazing build, nice welds as others have mentioned!

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Well damn.....nice job!

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

This is the coolest thing I’ve seen in a long time! And I’m 69 years old.

4 years ago | Likes 9 Dislikes 0

Nice

4 years ago | Likes 5 Dislikes 0

nice.

4 years ago | Likes 7 Dislikes 0

Nice

4 years ago | Likes 7 Dislikes 0

Where abouts are you? Does a bear sit in the woods?

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

:) That's some gorgeous fab, gratz on the final product.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Those weights look amazing.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Cool

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

@op, you tested how much the belts can hold, but seeing as how they're there to catch a falling weight, how much can be dropped on them? :-)

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

was thinking the same, might be able to work it out based on its max load, not me tho, i suck at maths

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

The weak point is the stitching, no calculations will help there, only some fun experimental drop tests. xD

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Awesome! After two weeks of use I could hang so much clothes on that.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Wow! Nice work. That's sweet you have a CNC. I did mine with a mag drill and it was gruelling.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Oh I see you jobbed it out. Good idea.

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I'm sure this was a labour of love, i you could do it quickly and scale it up, you could make a small fortune my friend.

4 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

nobody can do it quicker or at the scale of the chinese, so unless you get a name for yourself in the high-end market it's unlikely 1/2

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

2/2 you'll make any money on the amount of labor this takes. The high end market is hard to break into but it can be done (see Ghost Strong)

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

225 cm ≈ 7 feet, 4 5/8 inches

4 years ago | Likes 11 Dislikes 2

105 cm ≈ 3 feet, 5 3/8 inches

4 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

50 mm ≈ 2 inches

4 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

appx. 8 washing machines.

4 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

5 mm ≈ 200 thousandths of an inch

4 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

.............jfc, hahahaha

4 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

This is awesome. One thing - shock loads (like from dropping something) are many times higher than regular "live" loads, especially on 1/

4 years ago | Likes 45 Dislikes 0

non-stretchy material like nylon webbing. In climbing for example a 70kg person falling half a meter or so can break a 22kN (2200kgf) sling

4 years ago | Likes 29 Dislikes 0

So you really wanna be careful with that stitching and preferably do some calculations and/or make a spare one and test to destruction

4 years ago | Likes 26 Dislikes 0

“How not to high line” has break tests for the relevant webbing. And ya - static webbing doesn’t take well to dynamic loads

4 years ago | Likes 14 Dislikes 0

Okay, I see what you mean. You start out with a seatbelt a smidge tight, while the Rope arresting a fall has a lot more work to do to begin

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

This last part confused me, the entire point of a seat belt is to reduce the severity of the most dynamic load experience in the car

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 1

That’s... not quite the same shock. The seatbelt is “secured” against your form, so it’s not subject to dynamic load on itself so much as

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

3/ this is more “tie off one end of a static cord and dynamic cord and then drop a weight tied to the other end” kind of load. Shockloading

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

4/ as far as I’m understanding the physics/and being a rock climber (so some experience w/ these kinds of systems)

4 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

2/ acting as a static-restraint securing a static-to-itself load. The fact that it’s arresting momentum isn’t the issue

4 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0