Building a Home Gym

I got all my dumbbells, racks, and bench off of Craigslist for cheap. Got some cheap foam interlocking tile and put some cheap rubber mats over that to go under my bench. You should be able to get used dumbbells for $0.50 / lb or less. Adjustable ones are cheaper but less convenient. I went with the fixed hex dumbbells and love them.

Next piece of equipment will be a power rack so I can do some compound lifts at home. I'd also like to add a recumbent bike just so I could do cardio at home in crappy weather if I wanted to.

I'd check Craigslist and Play It Again Sports for deals on used equipment that's in good shape. You'll probably see a lot of nice equipment go up for sale after the New Year when everyone falls through on their resolution to lose 35 lbs in 3 weeks and sells all their newly purchased and barely used equipment.

You could get a piece of pipe and make a pull up bar for a doorway as well. Though the door mount ones are pretty cheap as it is.

Get a good quality white board for the wall. And a wall clock with a second hand.

Home Depot has 12"x12" mirror tiles...buy a bunch and stick them on the wall

Dumbbells, barbell, weight plates, bench, mats, and jump rope (great form of cardio, I do HIIT training with it). Since you want to work on pull ups I would suggest a pull up bar. You can get one and place it in your garage or you can purchase the ones that fit in your door.

http://www.artofmanliness.com/2013/03/21/how-to-build-the-ultimate-bodyweight-gym-using-only-pvc-pipe/

Heres a body weight gym made from PVC pipes.

That thing did not look very stout where it shows the guy doing suspension training.

If you're new to strength training and don't have equipment, I would suggest starting with body weight exercises. Between push-ups, pull-ups, and squats, you hit just about everything. If you can't do a pull-up, do step-offs to get stronger. Use a chair or something to get to the top of the movement and step off, slowly lowering yourself to the extended position. You can also do static hangs to build strength.

A set of Olympic weights, an adjustable bench, and a squat cage is all you really need. You can bench in the cage so you can set the safety rails so if you have to bail out, you don't need a spotter. Most cages have a chinup bar built in as well.

A horse stall mat or 2 on the floor is nice, gives good grip and protects your plates and floor from damage if you drop the bar doing deadlifts.

As others have said- don't buy new, look on craigslist or local classifieds, people are always selling weight gear. You might need to get the cage from an online place but they usually do free shipping.

We're house shopping and keen on a place with space for a simple home gym. Appreciate these ideas!

I love working out at home. Thanks for the great ideas.

previous posts make this redundant but: power rack, bench, barbell. all you'll ever need.

Bumping

Equipment:

- Power Cage (aka Power Rack), Squat Rack or Squat Stands.
The power cage is ideal because you can get a stand alone bench and set the safety catches to the proper height to allow you to bench inside the cage and safely to do without a spotter. Basically, when you arch your back to bench, the bar should be able to touch your chest, but when you lay flat it should hit the safety catches. I had to put two pieces of plywood underneath my bench to get this to work properly.

- A standalone bench (if getting a power cage) or a bench press
Self-explanatory. Just make sure you read weight limits and think about how much you will be benching + your own weight. One that can vary inclines would be good too.

- An olympic barbell
A standard 45lb one; or if you're not that strong yet, you can find 35lb or lighter ones online. Most on criagslist will be the 45lb ones. Make sure the bar is not bent much when buying on Craigslist.

- Dumbbells: Olympic dumbbell handles (takes olympic plates) or dumbbells of varying weights

- Olympic Plates
No milk jugs won't work. lol Just get how much you think you'll need. Realize you'll need either two of each for barbell exercises or four of each for dumbbell exercises with olympic DB handles. You will need multiple 10lb plates though (for making the jump from one 10 to one 25, etc.)

- Olympic spring collars
Stops the plates from moving around on the bar or dumbbells.


Nice extras:

- Bumper Plates
Not just for olympic lifts, but any floor lift where you're starting with a weight less than the bar + two 45's. If you can't afford these (they're not cheap) consider measuring the 45lb plate from the center to edge and get cinderblock(s) that equal that height. You can place the bar on these to raise it up when doing less than 45's. I've done this for years and it's worked for me.

- A simple pulley machine
I never got one of these, but a pulley machine would add a lot of exercises that hit muscles that are hard to hit with just barbells and dumbbells (such as lats if you're unable to do chinups).


Conditioning Equipment (if you're into that sort of thing):

- Prowler
It's a weight sled that had two upright handles you can push it with and you can also loop a rope with some PVC pipe handles through the hole in the front to do backwards and forwards drags. It can give you a brutal workout. I absolutely love/hate my Prowler!

Farmer's Walk Handles:

Look around for "Pitbull Strongman Equipment". He has a Myspace (lol I know), but his email is around somewhere. He has the cheapest Farmer's Walk handles around ($105 with shipping), but they are very sturdy.


Well that's all I have. I doubt you'll want everything I listed, but I wanted to show you options. My home gym is just a remnant of it's former glory since I started doing my lifting at a gym. But I still have my Prowler, Farmer's Walks handles, and a place to do floor lifts. If you have any more questions, I'd be happy to help.