Building the Ultimate Home Gym: Where to Splurge and Where to Save 

Yep! With the Strength Co. plates, your life gets exponentially better

My power rack (furnishing WFAC 8-9 yrs ago) with 3” spacing definitely doesn’t suck. I overlay the floor with mats or plywood as you referenced, Grant. And I am supremely happy with your plates and plate tree.

Besides the essentials mentioned, i.e. rack, barbell, plates, and bench, my next purchase would be some gymnastics rings. Cheap and incredibly useful for upper body work.

Love the Block Clock!

1” plate tree changes your life

Bought my Rep PR4000 set up on marketplace for cheap! All Rep bumper set, bench and barbell for $1000. I added the Rep rear stabilizer, front stabilizer legs and front safeties and bought a Bells of Steel bar for deadlifts outside of the rack, horse stall mats and wall mounted weight horns. Love my set up.

I travel for work and so get short-term memberships at lots of gyms. At my last one, the J-hooks were terrible, with huge hooks, you had to lift over an inch to get the bar to clear the hooks. Coupled with the 3 inch hole spacing, it was not comfortable. The J-hook and rack hardware were massive though, maybe 8-gauge steel, the hooks weighed maybe 15 or 20 pounds. The foam on the benches was so thick that presses were unstable, I was wobbling back and forth, scary.

German guy here,…. Coming from a fck around BB-Style type of Training, now hooked on the path of getting stronger for some time, my „wisdom“ of owning a home gym is the following. A Rack or Squat-Stand,…. or whatever prevents you from killing yourself while Training on your own, is a must. I used to squat and bench using some ridiculously dangerous DIY-Solutions,… don’t do it. The cheapest Rack you can find with a hole spacing of 5 cm is perfectly good. Mine has 10 cm, which is the only negative about it. I trained for years with a cheap 30 mm Bar and Plates. Three months ago I upgraded to a decent Weightlifting Bar, and a bunch of Barbell Standard Plates (I‘m a Sucker for their Look). The Bar is a bigger improvement as I expected it to be. The Plates,… they‘re ok. The finish isn’t top notch, the holes are quite big, and the weights differ from what they should be. But not that much, that it would be a big problem. I marked the plates as pairs, so the sides of the Barbell are loaded equally. I don‘t have a weight tree, and I don‘t want one. I store the plates on some sort of DIY-Rack, leaning against the Wall. Bench,…. Bought a mid-range Flat-Bench used. Bought it, and never thought about it afterwards. So… seems to be ok. As a conclusion,… I wouldn’t want to start without a Rack anymore. So,…. Save up to buy a Rack. Next would be the Barbell. Again… you could start with 30 mm, but at some point in time you will upgrade for sure. So go with a 50 mm Barbell from the start. Even if it‘s a cheap one,… doesn’t matter. At least you can use the Plates, once you might upgrade to a better Bar. Bench,… again,… doesn’t have to be fancy.

in my experience, a rogue boneyard bar, titan t2 rack (amazing value, comes with hooks, safties, horns.), facebook weightplates or amazon bumpers if u cant find any. for bench idk, i really like the rep comp one because its safe, sturdy, grippy and pretty much all you would ever need but it is 200 bux. thats my recommendation for newbies.

West side spacing is 5/8 holes spaced 1 inch or 25 mm (if it is from Rep). I think it is superior to the traditional 1 inch holes spaced 2 inches. Because nothing you do, no matter how strong you might be, is going to require 1 inch hardware over 5/8. Also it is typically slightly cheaper even though you get more holes.

Corp Bar and Strength Co plates. Rack that makes sense for your home gym Good flat bench Horse stall mats Plate tree

Been using a bench I made out of 2x4’s and a yoga mat for years.

Don't go cheap on the bench. I got a cheap bench as a gift and it was flexing a LOT with more than 2 plates on the bar. I switched to a heavy duty more expensive bench, and it is not only more stable and safer, it's easier to incline as well.

Are the majority of the 1inch plate trees spaced and angled so that you can slide things on/off with one hand or only the pricey ones from strength co and starting stength?

If it’s a Home gym and you are using the same plates every time, that is actually the lowest priority. A good bar and a 1 inch A-frame to hold the plates are the most important, a cheap rack, so you don’t kill yourself is the next most important tool.

First purchase 45 degree leg press. No question 😂

You should always get safety spotter arms. People have died from missing this simple thing.

I don't think there is a metaphor to match the cymbals. You can get big on logs and rocks. I'd say though don't go too cheap on rack, bar, or bench. These can actually kill you if they go south. There are some real cheap racks that look the part but are unsafe and can't hold much weight.