How to make dumbbells yourself

Not everyone who wants to play sports has enough time to visit the gym, and home training requires a certain equipment, the cost of which is quite high. The most popular are dumbbells. They are involved in almost all exercises. And if you are not planning to purchase sports equipment in the near future, you should not give up classes. You can make dumbbells with your own hands from fairly cheap materials. To do this, just read the instructions on how and what they are made of.

Content

  • 1 Dumbbells made of plastic bottles with your own hands
  • 2 bar made of plastic bottles
  • 3 Collecting concrete shells
  • 4 DIY Metal Dumbbells
  • 5 General tips and tricks for assembling dumbbells at home

DIY plastic bottle dumbbells

Ordinary plastic bottles allow dumbbells to be used immediately with minimal cost. The main thing is to fix structural elements well so that it does not collapse during training.

To assemble one plastic shell you will need: 2 bottles, adhesive tape or insulation tape, filler.

Step-by-step instructions for making dumbbells from plastic bottles:

  1. Cut out the middle part of the bottles. Fasten the separated elements (upper and lower) by means of an adhesive insulating tape.
  2. Filler is poured into the container. If the projectile is light weight, cement with sand is used. Dumbbells with a larger mass require the addition of metal inclusions, which can be balls from bearings, nails, a variety of metal. The choice depends entirely on the availability of a particular material.
  3. When the neck of the bottles is full, insert a pipe or stick made of metal or wood. They cover the joints with tape or tape. Thanks to this manipulation, you get a non-slip, soft and quite comfortable handle.

Before starting classes, you should carefully check all connections so that the filler does not “leak out”.

Plastic bottle bar

Conventional plastic bottles are suitable not only for collecting dumbbells, but also for barbells. This shell weighs much more, and therefore the amount of source material increases.

To assemble the rod you will need: at least 8 plastic bottles, fingerboard, filler material, electrical tape or tape.

Instructions for the manufacture of plastic rods:

  1. Bottles are filled in the same way as dumbbells.
  2. Select the material for the neck. It is better to take fittings or a pipe that lie comfortably in your hand.
  3. Ready loads from filled plastic bottles are placed at each end of the neck and wrapped with duct tape. On each side, four weights are obtained.
  4. Check the quality of the mount. The bar must not move out or form a backlash. If the connection is poor, wrap still tape.
  5. To increase the weight of the rod allows the laying between the loads of bottles of additional weighting agents in the form of bars and so on.
  6. Each additional load must be wrapped with a new layer of electrical tape. You can increase the load up to 100 kg.

It is quite difficult to navigate the choice of material. The approximate weight of a dumbbell or bar can be calculated based on the data presented:

Weight of a two-liter plastic bottle with various fillers:

  • water - 1.997;
  • compacted sand - 3.360;
  • wet sand - 3, 840;
  • crushed stone (cave) - 2, 600;
  • lead - 22, 800.

Weight is given in kilograms.

We collect concrete shells

The cement base allows you to get heavier dumbbells and barbells than using plastic bottles. Pancakes are obtained not only more impressive weight, but also look much more solid. They are cast from a cement mortar in a special form, inside of which is a fingerboard. The disadvantage of this design is that the load of the projectile cannot be regulated or adjusted to anyone else.

To start working with a different weight, you will need to make a new barbell or dumbbell. Weighting agents, in fact, are individual, and also quite fragile and "loose". The last drawback is eliminated by introducing glue into the PVA solution. And if the classes are not conducted according to the principle of powerlifting, when the projectile is thrown to the floor, then it will last quite a long time.

For the manufacture of concrete dumbbells (rods) you will need: a metal pipe with the required length, bolts or screws, cement mortar, PVA, as well as a mold for casting cargo.

Step-by-step instructions for the manufacture of cement shells:

  1. At the ends of the pipe with a drill, holes are made in four directions. Screws are screwed into the holes made so that they are most securely fixed at the ends and form a peculiar cross shape. They become the skeleton holding cement.
  2. The pancake dish is made from a flat bucket of mayonnaise or paint. You can use another capacity. The main thing is that the weight is selected so that it is necessary for classes and fits the body of the student. Glue is added to the hardness solution or oil paint is added.
  3. A pipe is placed in the flooded mixture and wait about four days until it is completely seized. The manipulations described in the previous paragraphs are repeated for the second side. Make a support. The design is tied up or suspended for another four days.
  4. When the cement has completely set, during the next week the shell is soaked at least twice in water so that it gains even greater strength.

Shells poured into a two-liter form can weigh about 5 kg. The exact weight is determined by the composition of the mixture involved.

To perform a “farmer's walk”, it is not necessary to make shells. It is enough to take two ordinary cans and hang them on a stick. You can use tires filled with sand or any other filler. Other exercises with a similar design are difficult to perform. They require the use of full dumbbells.

DIY metal dumbbells

When sports become regular, there is a need to purchase more professional equipment or to make such metal. They practically do not differ from the factory ones. The difference is that do-it-yourself dumbbells will cost much less. From one pipe, you can simultaneously make both the neck and pancakes. It is best to make stacked dumbbells from metal.

To make shells, it is necessary to prepare in advance: a thin-walled pipe having a diameter slightly larger than the neck, which is better to take a metal rod, locks and sheet steel. Work on the production of dumbbells should be carried out in a locksmith workshop.

Step-by-step instruction:

  1. From metal scrap with a diameter of about 3 cm, approximately 35-40 cm neck is sawn off. To make the shell comfortable to hold in your hands, about 15 cm are cut from a thin-walled pipe. The resulting segment is put on the neck. Further, if desired, it can be covered with a relief or wrapped with electrical tape.
  2. Pancakes are cut autogenous from sheet steel. The weight of one disk with a diameter of 18 cm and a thickness of 1 cm is 2 kg. This allows you to easily calculate the required number of pancakes to get a mass of 10, 20, 30, 40 kg. The dimensions of the disks also make it quite easy to change the weight of the weights from small to maximum. Cutting a whole set of pancakes allows you to constantly work with different weights.
  3. The next step is to make locks. The diameter of the pipe is taken more than that of the neck. Rings with a width of 3 cm are cut from the product. They should move freely along the bar, but not slip off. One hole with a diameter of at least 1-1.20 cm is drilled in the rings. They are necessary for screwing in the screws, which allows the rings to hold pancakes and press against the bar. The main thing is to take care of the high-quality pressing of the screw so that there are no backlashes.
  4. At the last stage, they begin to assemble the dumbbell. Pancakes are hung on the neck with a piece of pipe in the middle and secured with locks.

Dumbbells made in the described way are not inferior in quality to the factory ones, they allow working with both small and large weights.

General tips and tricks for assembling dumbbells at home

The best without any doubt are metal shells, but they are much more difficult to manufacture than other designs. It is necessary not only to make disks, but to choose the width of pancakes correctly, to perform locking locks in accordance with the calculations. It is recommended not to increase the width, but the diameter of the discs. You can make some heavy and several small pancakes.

To dumbbell looked presentable, the details are polished and painted. This will only slightly complicate the process of creating and increasing the cost of shells, but they will look no worse than factory shells, and have a much lower price. Classes with such equipment will bring more pleasure, and, consequently, the motivation and effect of training will increase.

You should not spend time and effort creating dumbbells weighing up to 100 kg. There are plenty of instructions for assembling such structures on the Internet, but it is better to immediately make a bar with the expectation of 200-300 kilos to perform deadlift. Dumbbells are not suitable for such loads. And if you pull the iron, then with a serious projectile, that is, a barbell.

If there is such an opportunity, you can buy a bar with a handle in the store, and you can either make pancakes yourself or order in the workshop. A well-made handle contributes to comfortable exercises, and home-made pancakes significantly reduce the cost of the total projectile.