Kettlebell swings are a great endurance exercise. Kettlebells are good, except they are expensive and as it feels lighter, you need to buy another. Therefore I set out to find an easier way. That’s when I came across a Do It Yourself, homemade swing bar.
If you don’t know how to do swings here is Tim Ferris, author of The 4 Hour Body, explaining how to do kettlebell swings.
Next here is a video Of Tim Ferris explaining how to make your own T-bar for swings.
The picture at the beginning of this post is the one that I actually made. In the video he’s using olympic plates. The free weight plates I had are standard plates that have a 1 inch diameter.
Therefore, I bought ¾ inch steel pipe. I went to my local Home Depot and the parts cost me around $22.00. I don’t know where he got his for about $10, but the fact that I have an adjustable Swing bar for only $22, is awesome.
My advice to you is to take a plate with you and make sure it fits the pipe you get. I have 2 other standard plates that don’t fit on the pipe. It’s not a big deal, but you don’t want to buy it and then find out it doesn’t fit.
The Setup
Everything I bought was ¾ inch pipe.
2) 4 inch long pipe
1) 10 inch long pipe
1) Flange
1) T-connector
1) Clamp
Look around for those clamps. At Home Depot they had a few for around $3-$6. But I found this one there for 99¢. And make sure the clamp actually clamps onto the pipe and doesn’t slip off.
Take note that when putting it together, they don’t thread in all the way. That’s important because you don’t want the handles to extend out past the edge of your hands. If they do, then they may hit your legs or force you to stand with a wider stance.
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