just curious on what you guys suggest. I visited the local ny barbell and the oly dumbells they weere showing me for 40 $ werent bad. Whats the purpose of a rotating handle on it?
The sleeves rotate for the same reason as they do on oly bars, the bar would roll out of your hand if the plates get inertia and start rolling. Its a big safety factor.
As well, its probably easier to assemble / produce.
[quote]Synthetickiller wrote:
The sleeves rotate for the same reason as they do on oly bars, the bar would roll out of your hand if the plates get inertia and start rolling. Its a big safety factor.
As well, its probably easier to assemble / produce. [/quote]
Hmm, not sure I agree with either of these. I’ve never seen a dumbell in a commercial gym that has a rotating sleeve, so I wouldn’t worry too much about inertia and having the DB roll out of your hand.
As well, I would think it would be much easier to weld the handle as one solid piece, rather than fitting it with bearings so that it would rotate smoothly. The cheaper ones are almost always one solid handle.
The rotating sleeve will be better if you are doing DB Snatches, Cleans, etc. If you are just rowing or DB pressing, then it’s probably not a big factor.
I have a $10 pair i bought from Wal-mart about 6 years ago…i’ve dropped them, loaded them to 200+lb, pressed them, thrown them…they’ve never given me any trouble.
thanks for the responses, they sell oly sized db’s at walmart? thought they only had standard sized. thakns for the responses
[quote]Modi wrote:
Synthetickiller wrote:
The sleeves rotate for the same reason as they do on oly bars, the bar would roll out of your hand if the plates get inertia and start rolling. Its a big safety factor.
As well, its probably easier to assemble / produce.
Hmm, not sure I agree with either of these. I’ve never seen a dumbell in a commercial gym that has a rotating sleeve, so I wouldn’t worry too much about inertia and having the DB roll out of your hand.
As well, I would think it would be much easier to weld the handle as one solid piece, rather than fitting it with bearings so that it would rotate smoothly. The cheaper ones are almost always one solid handle.
The rotating sleeve will be better if you are doing DB Snatches, Cleans, etc. If you are just rowing or DB pressing, then it’s probably not a big factor.[/quote]
DB bars exist so that people can afford to have a DB set for cheap (just put on as many plates as you want, and go). They are not subjected to the same forces that a solid dumbbell is.
Its basic physics. You have a rotating plate that spins in one direction. All the other plates will begin to spin as well and the bar will roll if you don’t allow the sleeves to rotate with them. A single solid dumbbell doesn’t do this b/c it has no plates or moving parts (no plates that are detachable). The heads can’t spin, ever. Pick up a physics book and read about rotational force (torque).
That would severely affect doing DB shrugs and so on. DB bars are not made with the idea that people will only bench or curl with them. It fixes a lot of problems.
Sorry to be a dick, just pointing out facts.
I’ve never seen an olympic DB bar that did not have rotating sleeves which allowed you to load the plates yourself.
If anyone could point out one thats commonly produced, i’d be interested, thanks.
I snagged a pair of OL dbs from Wal-mart also along with an OL ez curl bar for 25$. Can’t beat that. I also beat them up pretty well too.
[quote]Synthetickiller wrote:
Modi wrote:
Synthetickiller wrote:
The sleeves rotate for the same reason as they do on oly bars, the bar would roll out of your hand if the plates get inertia and start rolling. Its a big safety factor.
As well, its probably easier to assemble / produce.
Hmm, not sure I agree with either of these. I’ve never seen a dumbell in a commercial gym that has a rotating sleeve, so I wouldn’t worry too much about inertia and having the DB roll out of your hand.
As well, I would think it would be much easier to weld the handle as one solid piece, rather than fitting it with bearings so that it would rotate smoothly. The cheaper ones are almost always one solid handle.
The rotating sleeve will be better if you are doing DB Snatches, Cleans, etc. If you are just rowing or DB pressing, then it’s probably not a big factor.
DB bars exist so that people can afford to have a DB set for cheap (just put on as many plates as you want, and go). They are not subjected to the same forces that a solid dumbbell is.
Its basic physics. You have a rotating plate that spins in one direction. All the other plates will begin to spin as well and the bar will roll if you don’t allow the sleeves to rotate with them. A single solid dumbbell doesn’t do this b/c it has no plates or moving parts (no plates that are detachable). The heads can’t spin, ever. Pick up a physics book and read about rotational force (torque).
That would severely affect doing DB shrugs and so on. DB bars are not made with the idea that people will only bench or curl with them. It fixes a lot of problems.
Sorry to be a dick, just pointing out facts.
I’ve never seen an olympic DB bar that did not have rotating sleeves which allowed you to load the plates yourself.
If anyone could point out one thats commonly produced, i’d be interested, thanks.[/quote]
Dude, don’t be a dick. No one needs that, there are already plenty of them on this board, and we don’t need another one.
I don’t need to pick up a physics book, I have a decent grasp of physics and most thing related to lifting.
If you do a google search, you’ll probably find plenty of Oly DB’s that have a fixed handle.
I didn’t point this out to be a dick. I phrased it so as not to be confrontational. If you want to go that route, find a different board to post on.
I’ve been looking for oly db handles for a while now at various fitness equipment stores without success. I’ll have to check out wally world tomorrow. Glad I clicked on this thread.
Fred
They are called Olympic for a reason, they are designed to take Olympic plates.
Olympic barbells are designed for Olympic lifts where the wrist rotates around the bar during the lift (if you have ever tried cleans with a solid bar you will understand very quickly why Olympic bars are designed to rotate) very east to bugger your wrists without an Olymipc bar even on deadlifts.
I suspect this is the same reason Olympic dumbells are made in a similar manner to accomodate variation of Olymipic lifts using dumbells and lifts where your wrist rotates around the bar.
[quote]JamFly wrote:
They are called Olympic for a reason, they are designed to take Olympic plates.
Olympic barbells are designed for Olympic lifts where the wrist rotates around the bar during the lift (if you have ever tried cleans with a solid bar you will understand very quickly why Olympic bars are designed to rotate) very east to bugger your wrists without an Olymipc bar even on deadlifts.
I suspect this is the same reason Olympic dumbells are made in a similar manner to accomodate variation of Olymipic lifts using dumbells and lifts where your wrist rotates around the bar.[/quote]
I suspect Olympic dumbbells were originally designed so that people could make an affordable set of dumbbells out of the olympic plates they already owned. I don’t know the actual history of the creation of the Olympic dumbbell, so I’m just making an assumption here.
I still stand by my original comment:
The rotating sleeve will be better if you are doing DB Snatches, Cleans, etc. If you are just rowing or DB pressing, then it’s probably not a big factor.
[quote]Modi wrote:
I still stand by my original comment:
The rotating sleeve will be better if you are doing DB Snatches, Cleans, etc. If you are just rowing or DB pressing, then it’s probably not a big factor. [/quote]
Fully agree… the dumbbells in my gym don’t rotate… They’ve fixed handles. Just like pretty much every gym in the world. I don’t see what the big deal is!