Up to date in 2022 to discover some extra J-hook choices.
The Darkish Ages
In early energy racks you’ll see a pair of modified bolts going by way of the rack and protruding to carry the bar.
What seems to be those self same York bolts are nonetheless made as bar holders for the throwback Beginning Energy Energy Rack above.
The bolt crushes your bar knurling with its very small contact space towards the bar. Again within the day, the overwhelming majority of bars in house gyms have been low-cost and never value defending. Now that persons are paying extra consideration to the standard of bars, and the worth has come down on them to make them accessible to extra individuals, defending the bar knurling has grow to be a better precedence.
All-Metal J-Hooks
Extra engineering was put into the form of those than the sooner pin designs.
These have grow to be onerous to seek out too, in favor of those within the subsequent part. They’re made with a C-channel bracket for a flip-down design, like most rack attachments now.
Observe that Rogue and a few others name them J-cups, whereas others name them J-hooks. Similar actual factor.
A J-hook has a wider contact space towards your bar than a spherical peg. This results in much less extreme pounding-in of the knurling, however it additionally results in scratches over a bigger space, shaving off the knurling. All in all, I don’t assume it’s a complete lot higher on this respect. Metal-on-steel is rarely a factor for sturdiness.
Notably, they do have a backplate so that you can stroll the bar in to rack it towards, from which the bar can fall straight down into the hook with out catching on something, in contrast to the bolt design additional above the place it might catch and freak you out.
There’s one doable drawback to J-hooks vs the easy bolts that the above pic illustrates. A bolt holds the bar on the similar top you stick the bolt by way of. The J-hook holds the bar a number of inches decrease. For those who occur to be properly over 6ft tall and also you’re utilizing a shorter squat rack just like the Rogue SML-1, you would run into an issue with the max bar top.
UHMW Plastic Lined J-Hooks
Now we’re into present know-how. This was a much-needed improve over all-steel J-hooks. The within of the J-hooks have UHMW (extremely excessive molecular weight) plastic liners to guard your bar’s knurling and scale back noise.
Such a plastic is tough and sturdy and has withstood the take a look at of time on this software. It is not going to crack, even with a loaded bar slammed down onto it.
Usually the wear and tear towards the plastic, or towards all-steel J-hooks for that matter, comes from you rotating the loaded bar as you attempt to slide it again centered after racking it, digging the knurling into the floor. Different regular use simply doesn’t put on the plastic in any respect.
The correct time period in industrial functions for this materials is UHMWPE, extremely excessive molecular weight polyethylene. Within the fitness center gear business it has gotten shortened to UHMW, or UHMW plastic. There are others reminiscent of HDPE, excessive density polyethylene. UHMWPE is the strongest.
As you’ll be able to see within the pic of Rogue’s above, the again within the C-channel has a UHMW plastic liner as properly, to guard the rack and scale back clanging noise.
Nonetheless, try this downside…
Most UHMW lined J-hooks, together with Rogue, don’t shield the entrance lip of the cup. So in case your bar rolls ahead to the lip, which is often the place you need it for unracking, then you definately’re scratching up your bar. There’s room to line the lip too. They select to not do it to save lots of on prices.
FringeSport, Bells of Steel, and Valor Fitness are three corporations who pad the interior lip of their J-hooks, or no less than on some fashions.
Replace: Cary within the feedback under introduced Aperture Engineering’s J-hook liners to my consideration to handle this challenge. I subsequently reviewed a pair.
Warning: Some J-hooks are “upgraded” with a strip of some skinny protecting tape just like the above, which is trash and can put on out rapidly. In a single diagram, they are saying this tape is simply meant for defense throughout delivery, which is nonsense due to the place it’s positioned, and the best way all their footage embody it.
Premium Choice 1: Sandwich J-Hooks
What are these “sandwich” J-hooks, why are they costlier, and why does anybody need them?
That’s what I believed after I first bumped into them on-line. What’s flawed with different J-hooks? Effectively, I’ll inform you.
A thick chunk of UHMW plastic is sandwiched and bolted in between two thick metal plates in a manner the place the plastic stands out throughout. This design has a pair main benefits.
First, when you re-rack too low, into the underside entrance of the J-hook, you’re nonetheless solely hitting the plastic, not metal such as you would with common J-hook that solely have plastic liners on the within of the hook. It’s additionally so tall that when you rack the bar a number of inches too excessive you’re nonetheless on the J-hook.
Second, the skinny design of sandwich J-hook (it’s just one.5″ thick side-to-side) offers you extra room for side-to-side slop when racking the bar. That places you at far much less danger of hitting the shoulder of the bar on the J-hook as you rack the bar and making an attempt to look to your aspect to see what’s occurring. You acquire on an inch or two of room on each side. The hook protrudes far sufficient from the rack that the bar shoulder is not going to hit the rack’s metal upright.
Whereas your bar is the principle factor to be sure you like in your fitness center, as a result of it’s the factor you’re straight dealing with, the J-hooks of a rack are maybe the following factor, as a result of they management how simple it’s for the bar to work together with the rack.
A number of producers make these. Rep Health makes good ones which might be 100% suitable with Rogue racks at lower than half the worth of Rogue. Particularly, Rep’s PR-4000 sandwich J-cups match Monster Lite racks, whereas their PR-5000 sandwich J-cups (choose them on the identical web page) match Monster racks. Usually Rep’s pricing is nearer to Rogue, as their high quality is about the identical, however on this case it’s a steal.
Rep additionally makes rounded sandwich J-hooks. They offer the benefit of the bar being at all times racked evenly entrance to again on each hooks, although not essentially even laterally (see the curler J hooks part under for an answer to that). The drawback is you need to clear extra of the J-hook, each vertically and horizontally, when lifting off, and I personally would discover that too annoying.
Different manufacturers have awful cross-brand compatibility. They should match proper. See the power rack accessories and compatibility guide.
Rogue makes some extra-wide 2″ sandwich J cups for his or her Monster racks, that are made with the {hardware} recessed into the design in order that no bolts are protruding, for a cleaner look and no potential of the shoulder of your bar hitting a bolt.
Premium Choice 2: Curler J-Hooks
With curler J-hooks, re-centering the bar earlier than every set turns into trivial with the nylon curler that’s set over a metal pin. Usually it’s an onerous activity when you have loads of weight on the bar. I think about the thought has been round for some time. I noticed a clip of Alan Thrall a while again constructing some metal ones into his olympic bench earlier than I discovered any of those on the market.
The above are from Titan Fitness, who at present has them in 4 sizes to suit every of their rack sequence, which makes them suitable with the vast majority of different manufacturers of racks. Titan’s racks are metric sized at 75mm sq. tubing, however these ought to match over imperial 3″x3″ tubing too. The difficulty you’ll run into is their gap spacing can also be metric and the locking pin won’t line up in your rack.
Basement Brandon identified within the under video that curler J-hooks should be prevented from swinging sideways, as a result of lateral pressure you apply to roll the bar. So that they both want to suit snugly sufficient that the curler capabilities earlier than the entire attachment swings or the attachments want a locking pin like Titan’s above.
XII:XI Fitness, a small metallic fabricator in PA, has these curler J-hooks that reportedly match good and cushty on Rogue and every other true 3″x3″ tubing, making them maybe the very best deal for the very best match on many racks.
Some rollers are tapered, not straight like Titan, forcing the bar into one spot – quite a bit like rounded sandwich J-cups do as talked about in a piece additional above – and making re-racking presumably unnerving.
Though I usually give attention to US-based corporations, Irwin Fitness, delivery out of Canada, is one different firm that can make them with flat rollers as an possibility, and so they reportedly match completely comfortable on true 3″x3″ tubing.
The Proper Match
I discussed this within the part above on curler J-hooks, however this goes for all kinds. Not like another energy rack attachments, any J-hooks want to suit fairly properly in your rack. You don’t need vital slop in the case of a safety-critical half like J-hooks that must really feel strong. This contains each the tubing measurement and the opening measurement being match.
That being stated, when you’re a persistent DIYer and good along with your arms, reducing some shims from UHMW plastic sheets with an influence software is a doable technique to match outsized J-hooks on smaller tubing.
