Cheap Pull Up station reccomendations please?
I need a pull up station, NOT a pull up bar, because I plan on doing bodyweight dead lifts and what will practically be gymnastics on that bar in the middle of summer AND winter and jungle gyms just dont cut it in the canadian fall and winter obviously. Im only 5’9 and Im in toronto if that helps.
Any ideas please? Could I just go to like a landfill and pick up some discarded metal bars and like get them welded together? Or do I just buy one of those big coat racks and remove the wheels on the legs and weld on a steel platform for each of the legs??.
I live in an apartment so I cant screew in anythinng or damage rhe paint or the drywall cause its illegal . also those pull up bars that use thresholds to stay put are also not enough for me because I plan on doing some absolutely looney stuff like the german hang, the front lever, bback lever, human flag , tne one armed pull up and muscle ups on that pull up station lol.
and by Bodyweight Deadlifts I mean this: https://m.youtube.com/shorts/SjqhGRQcMJE
I also plan on doing this: https://m.youtube.com/shorts/EVCeuFlBRHc though I have no idea what the exercise is called but FlexyDave showed it to me and I fell inlove with it. And Ill even be swinging while Im upside down like that. AND Ill be doing abdominal curls or ‘upside down sit-ups’ (if thats what theyre called) as Im upside down like that.
I thoughtk Ive found what I was looking for: https://www.baseblocks.com/products/the-big-bar-pro . Very simplistic . and it appears to be abble to handle a lot of vertical load but The reviews on the website say that the station kind of slips and slides if you try to put any horizontal forces UNLESS you hold it down with sand bags. But Im gonna put this thing in my bedroom so sandbags are kind of out of the question… So my search is still on.
Also if anyone knows how I can put sandbags in a bedroom without sand flying all over the place please let me know
And no I wont be going to the gym to get access to a pull up station
I can buy it for a maximum of 600 CAD$
Thanks to anyone who answers.
Edit: Ive decided that above the bar exercises probably wouldnt be the best to do in an apartment bedroom as I dont know how high the bar will be when I ourchase the prpduct in relation to the height of the apartment’s ceilings-to-floor measurements. Ill jsut save those for the jungle gymsn when summer and late spring come around.
13 replies
For as much force as you're going to be putting into this thing I don't think anything freestanding is going to be a good experience for you. It's going to move, even if just slightly, without some serious foundation weight.
When you say serious foundation weight? Im curious , do tell what amount of weight youre thinkingg of please and why?
Like if I only weigh 165 and I do plan on kipping and swinging on that bar what amount of weight would I need to keep it in place please?
It's more about the physics of it. Even with a wide base, you're applying force to the top of the setup which will almost always allow some amount of movement. I would be concerned about the base damaging the floor during this movement.
Static movements would be much easier to accommodate in an apartment. Maybe you could save the dynamic movements for the gym or the park when the weather allows?
I already have to go 7 months without doing any pull ups at all. So no.
And when it comes to damage the floor I was thinking of maybe putting something soft or elastic there to protect the floor like a set of sticky rubber flat things to absorb the force. Bad idea or good idea in your opinion? WIll these slide around too much in your opinion?
Also about the gym is Im literally so poor I cant even afford to go to the gym ... Ya thats how poor I am.
What about something like planet fitness? It's like $10-20/mo here.
I have to save EVERY penny just for university. Thats how bad my situation is :/
That's fair. I guess my point was that what you're looking for might need to be even more robust than you originally thought.
The rack you posted has some height to it, so I'm assuming that space isn't an issue. That 89" puts you close to a standard 8' ceiling.
First opinion and why. The PR-1000 has pegs on the back of it to stack 45 pound plates and will fit in roughly the space you're talking about. Of course, they don't make it anymore.
https://www.jayshomegym.com/rep-pr-1000/
What they do have is the PR-1100, and one of the FAQs is the difference between it and the PR-1000.
https://repfitness.com/products/pr-1100-power-rack?variant=41268793868446
If you are going to be doing bar exercises, get an extra set of J-cups for a bench position and a squat position. I also agree with PlantJam about the thing doing some moving on you.
Thanks
Also Oh I forgot to mention I dont plan on doing squats or like barbell anythings. I just need the bar for pull ups and to do dead hangs. Ive decided that above the bar exercises probably wouldnt be the best to do in an apartment bedroom as I dont know how high the bar will be when I ourchase the prpduct in relation to the height of the apartment's ceilings-to-floor measurements. Ill jsut save those for the jungle gymsn when summer and late spring come around.
Also each story of the apartment building Im in is about a little over than 3 metres so slightly over 9 feet.
Also this cubic design for a pull up station is exactly what I had in probably need cause Ill be doing a TON of kipping on it https://repfitness.com/products/pr-1100-power-rack?variant=41268793868446 but would you happen to know if this is the cheapest full steel one on the market right now available to be shipped to canada please?
I would not. I bought something similar (maybe a predecessor to the PR-1000?) and like it. Don't overlook those dip attachments. At the time I bought it they had it on amazon which meant prime free shipping. I peeked and sure enough it's on amazon now, but I don't know what the shipping situation is, and especially not up north. Sorry.
I don't remember a lot from my downselect process, but on the other side of the purchase locally sourced stuff from a big box sporting goods store can't touch it on quality or price. They seem to prefer machines with more bells and whistles while I prefer not dropping a bar on my neck while bench pressing alone. Those safety cross pieces aren't a joke.
Also, you said you weighed only 165 or so. Think about it this way: that's roughly three 45 pound plates and a 25 pound plate, hanging from a chain on whatever it is you end up buying. You may still not have enough beef in that rack to support aggressive swinging without good weights on the bottom to balance. Doublecheck my math, though.
I was thinking of buying a couple 50 or even 100 pound dumbells and using those to anchor that to the floor. Is this a bad idea in any way? I feel like a problem that will arise will be that the dumbells are probably not the best thing to hold a power tower with , as in theyre not as suitable for the job as just nailing the thing down.
Also I wonder would it be a bad idea to just ask around to find where I cant get a solid steel platform welded to the bottom of the rack and use that instead to anchor it?
My model has pegs on the back that will hold 45 pound olympic plates diameter wise, but you have to offset it from the wall a bit to account for the plate.
There's been a lot of "you can try this" and "maybe" sorts of advice in this thread, but here's something more concrete: smaller plates are going to be easier to move than larger ones, and the larger (weight) ones have to be larger (size) than the smaller ones (size and weight). You're going to find more 45 pound plates than you will 100 pound plates if you're shopping for them and more ways to store the smaller ones than you will the larger ones. You're also going to want symmetry to whatever extent possible, so two 45 pound plates is better than one 100 pound plate.
The last time I was in the game I would look for $/pound. At that time, there wasn't anything better in this metric than regular olympic plates unless you're in a training montage set on a farm or in the woods. They tended to be a little more than $1/plate before tax. Now they're more expensive because everything is, but they're cheaper than stuff like kettlebells or fixed sized dumbells if you're just considering "heavy" as your metric. If you go that route, then you have some more things available to you in your ecosystem, even if you're not interested:
Those choices are specifc based on the following points: the locking collars on the dumbell bar can NOT be the simple spring type as they're not strong enough to hold the plates in various orientations. The curl bar gives you some flexibility for width if you're in a confined space for deadlifts. (EDITED for correctness): The 300 pound set is $1/pound
PLUS a free bar if you want to think of it that wayif you count the bar, and I have seen those sets go for $250 making them the most economical weight set I know of. It helps if you have a local place because shipping is hell for this sort of thing. And all this just to hold down your pull-up rig. Now, I checked my PR-1000 or whatever it is. IF one were to lower the safety bars to their lowest setting, then the 45 pound plates that I have (they have little rubber bumpers) barely do not clear the bolts holding the frame together. A 35 pound plate on the lowest setting or a 45 pound plate on the next lowest setting would easily clear those bolts. The safety bar is 1" in diameter so a regular plate might fit on it, but the olympic plates are more of a guarantee and more standard. The back-to-front inner length of my rack is a little more than 25", and a 35 pound plate is around 1.25" wide, so with an infinite budget and against manufacturers recommendations (it says the PR-1100 can't be bolted down and isn't recommended for kipping up) we can get 20 35 pound plates (700 pounds) low to the ground per side, but 25 pounds plates might be more long term flexible. That moves the problem away from whether this MacGyver contraption is going to flip on you to the structural limits of the rack and the floor it's sitting on. Note that anyone reading should follow the limits specified by the manufacturer and should also follow local building codes about how much weight they can put on a floor.So, takeaways:
Thanks for suggesting using plates to weigh down the machine . I was thinking of using dumvells but thats clearly a worse idea.