DIY Olympic technique bar

Rick Deckart · 04-13-2007, 10:47 AM

I always wanted to have a technique bar, don't know why exactly but thought it would be good to have a light bar, regulation size with very light training plates for the correct distance to the ground. A couple of month I ago I made one, for free.

That's the commercial variant, cost in Germany around 300 EUR...

http://www.eleikosport.se/eng/Produc...&Product_Id=23

That's mine, regulation size sleeves of course non revolving, made from 25 mm diameter alluminum tube (wall 3.5mm EDIT: measured it today again) which I got for free. The alluminium is secured by screws in the wooden sleeves and I have clean & jerked with this bar over 50kg without a problem. Weight is around 1.6kg and loaded with two 2.5kg plates it has a comparable whip to an olympic bar.

Rick Deckart · 04-17-2007, 11:53 AM

Tools:

A 25mm drill
screwdriver
smoothing plane, if the round timber for the sleeves is >=50mm diameter

Material list:

~500mm of 51mm diameter round wooden stick
some scrap wood to make plate holders
1650mm x 25mm aluminium tube, wall thickness 3.5mm (I did weighted chinups with 32kg on this tubes...) alternatively a wooden broomstick would do fine
four screws per sleeve

Dimensions:

distance between sleeves: 1330mm
length of sleeves: 200mm
diameter of sleeves: 48mm (shaved down from ~51mm stock)
thickness of plate holders: 20mm
diameter of plate holders: ~70mm
total length: ~1780mm

Cut the sleeves to 200mm length and drill a centered hole, diameter ~25mm into the sleeves. It should be ~140mm deep. Cut some round plate holders (don't know the correct word) , drill a 25mm hole into them too, and attach them to the sleeves with three screws. Place the bar into the sleeves and drill one perpendicular hole half way through the sleeve. Secure the bar with a countersinked screw and you are ready. Cheap, easy to build and a much better feel than a single broomstick... besides as the diameter of the sleeves is slighty lower than regulation size, the plates do rotate, pretty good indeed...