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Building Outdoor Pull-Up Bar and Parallel Bars

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Pull-ups and dips are among the best exercises for the upper body. So,  I have always wanted to build the necessary exercise equipment in my backyard. Our move to San Jose and this excellent article on HowToMatic provided the critical mass to get me started. This post captures all you need to know to build your own.

Necessary Tools and Materials

I got everything I needed at Home Depot, except for the bungee ropes, which I already had.

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Fig. 1  Tools and materials

 

Building the Equipment

1. Have a plan. Here’s what mine looked like:

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Fig. 2  Equipment diagram

 

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Fig. 3 Final result

2. Dig the 6 holes. It took me about 4 hours to dig all of them without killing myself and I made the mistake of digging them a bit too narrow. Don’t be afraid to dig wide. The holes need to be at least 1.5 feet (50 cm) deep and need to be about 1.5 feel (50 cm) in diameter.

3. Drill holes for the pipes through the wooden beams. Drill about 4 inches (10 cm) away from the end of the beam. Don’t forget to wear glasses / goggles for eye protection. You can either drill al the way through the entire beam or drill just on one side of the beam. In retrospect, I should have done the latter for all holes.

4. Position the beams in the holes. Use small stones and the bungee ropes to ensure that the beams are properly positioned and straight. I decided to make one side of the dip bars slightly wider than the other side – for exercise versatility – so my dip bars are not exactly parallel. Position the pipes into the beam holes.

5. Prep the concrete, following the directions on the bag. I prepped the concrete one bag at a time. Mixing concrete is tough so I recommend the following workflow:

  • Pour all water you need for a full bag of concrete in the bucket
  • Pour half a bag of concrete in the bucket. Mix, until you get a homogenous mixture.
  • Pour the other half – mix again.
  • Work fast – you have less than 5 minutes to mix the whole bag and probably another 5 minutes to pour the concrete into the holes.
  • Use some help – having a second set of hands helps a lot.

6. Pour the concrete into the holes, compressing it.

7. Clean up. Let it cure for a day before using the equipment. Then drill the small holes for the screws to prevent the pipes from rotating.

Frankly, I loved the physical labor, and you will too… It is a surprisingly therapeutic and rewarding experience.

 

Exercises

The great thing about this setup is that you can do all sorts of different exercises that develop strength and agility, using the weight of your own body, for example…

I recommend starting with chin-ups and dips (3 sets each, max repetitions in each set) and progressing from there.

Enjoy!

Comments

  • Anonymous
    August 19, 2010
    This is a very good piece of work. Keeps you fit and one can enjoy doing things like this.

  • Anonymous
    August 19, 2010
    Yeah, it was a lot of fun.

  • Anonymous
    October 07, 2010
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    October 07, 2010
    @Loer: No, no rust on the iron. The original article on HowToMatic suggested painting the bars too, but I have done fine without paint.

  • Anonymous
    January 02, 2011
    This is great. Just what I was looking to do. Thanks for the how to.

  • Anonymous
    January 15, 2011
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 08, 2011
    I guess, you can attach the dip station also to the pull up station and save 2 beams and some space. But I dont know if you can get them narrow enough into a V shape.

  • Anonymous
    May 28, 2011
    How long did this take you to build?

  • Anonymous
    June 15, 2011
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    July 17, 2011
    I know what the diameter of the pipes are.  What about the thickness or guage of the pipes?  How thick do they need to be so that they don't bend?

  • Anonymous
    July 19, 2011
    @mark: The thickness of mine is about 1.5-2 mm I think - they are just the regular iron pipes sold at Home Depot. I think anything above 1 mm should be sufficient.

  • Anonymous
    July 24, 2011
    I am currently deployed and am an avid pullup, muscle up, L's and lots of other type exercises with these bars.  I will use these plans for my back yard gym.  Great job Ivo and thanks!!!

  • Anonymous
    July 31, 2011
    Thanks Ivo.  And thanks for the informative blog.

  • Anonymous
    August 21, 2011
    This is a terrible set up. If you actually plan to use this it will not last. All these poor people are responding to this article thinking this is a great plan and are going to have a garbage set-up. I don't feel like posting the plan but I built a great pull up bar (roughly same materials) for a third the price this guy is talking about and it will last 20 years longer. If anyone finds this article and wants some real help with the plans just email me and I'll send you the specs and simple instructions. I think pursuing fitness is great and I'm willing to help out anyone who needs it. exceedthestandard@yahoo.com

  • Anonymous
    September 23, 2011
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    September 30, 2011
    The Eli comment is spam, he's just after people's email addresses and then he'll send you spam. He doesn't have a better solution and he can't even comment why his is better.It's a pointless comment with no content -  Ignore it.

  • Anonymous
    December 27, 2011
    thank you for posting in this site I will bookmark this site and tell my friend about this nice site to blog... <a href="www.chinupbarsforhome.org/.../">Chin Up Bars For Home</a>

  • Anonymous
    March 06, 2012
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 06, 2012
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 27, 2012
    How could i make the bottom portable instead of concrete?

  • Anonymous
    April 02, 2012
    My pull up bar wobbles a bit. is that normal, because one of the wooden posts isn't completely vertical.

  • Anonymous
    April 02, 2012
    also, is there anything i can do to fix it without building a new one?

  • Anonymous
    April 02, 2012
    @ Acumagnet: You could use pipes for a portable pull-up bar. I thought of doing that at first, but decided to drop it, since achieving true portability was not an easy thing to do... @Michael: That should be ok -- mine wobbles quite a bit too. The top of the pull up bar moves horizontally by as much as 10 inches when I do pull-ups. It hasn't been a problem so far.

  • Anonymous
    April 02, 2012
    thank you for the advice. But does it matter if you do muscle ups? Because it looks like doing muscle ups on a wobbly pull up bar seems pretty dangerous and scary.

  • Anonymous
    April 03, 2012
    It does wobble a bit more when I do muscle ups. Still hasn't been a huge concern. If yours wobbles too much, I'd suggest trying to stabilize the bar with ropes attached to the bar and to the ground. Kinda what they do in the gyms

  • Anonymous
    May 22, 2012
    Thanks for the instructions.  I'm hoping to build an outdoor structure like this in the near future.  I have built a few indoor pull up bar systems.  If anyone is interested, they can see some photos here: southpasstrength.com/.../garage-gym-how-to-build-pull-up-bars-overview

  • Anonymous
    July 13, 2012
    Great post brotha! Going to put my station together today!

  • Anonymous
    August 25, 2012
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    August 27, 2012
    @Ayman: It's a 9 ft, 4x4 beam -- see the table and diagram at the top. Ivo

  • Anonymous
    August 27, 2012
    @Brandon: Thanks for the pointer! These look great. Ivo

  • Anonymous
    November 09, 2012
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    November 09, 2012
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    November 25, 2012
    Hey Ivo Thanks for a fantastic post, just what I needed. I am going to build this over the winter, and try to integrate one side of the dip bar into the taller upright for the pullup bar. I am going to try to build some other equipment myself for me, and the kids. I think having something like this in your own backyard is a great way to get the children exercising. Check out my VERY new site at http:///www,thriveful.com for some more ideas and info on building a wonderful healthy life. Cheers

  • Anonymous
    December 10, 2012
    Thank you Ivo for sharing this project with the world. I am planning to build something similar. What height do you think is needed for the use of rings?

  • Anonymous
    December 17, 2012
    @Paul: Sorry for not responding earlier. I think you need another 4-5 feet or so for rings.

  • Anonymous
    March 08, 2013
    I was planning on building a very similar structure and I am going to include the height for my rings as well. Thanks for the layout, this saved me a lot of time and problem some error as well. Much appreciated!

  • Anonymous
    March 31, 2014
    Thanks for the detail plans, they helped me get a good estimate for the build I am going for. A few changes I will make is to share 1 post between the parallel bars and pull up bar, and adding a vertical bar mounted to the side of the shared post for "Flag workouts". The shared post will hopefully increase stability and decrease cost. Would you recommend using 6x6 post instead of the 4x4 for stability? That is what I was planning on doing, but wasn't sure if it was worth the trouble. I want it to last, and be able to stand up to intense workouts. Thanks

  • Anonymous
    March 31, 2014
    @Kale: Yes, definitely go for 6x6s for the pull-up bar. 4x4s work fine as long as you don't swing. When you start swinging (which is an exercise of its own), they feel a bit unstable. You don't need 6x6s for the parallel bars -- 4x4s work great there.

  • Anonymous
    April 01, 2014
    Using 4x4 for the parallel bars makes since and will cut the cost significantly. Thanks for the feedback!

  • Anonymous
    April 22, 2014
    Omg  i whant to see the real gymnastics bar

  • Anonymous
    April 22, 2014
    Omg i what to see the real gymnastics bar

  • Anonymous
    June 15, 2014
    do you find the pull up bar rotates at all when using it?

  • Anonymous
    February 20, 2015
    Thanks for posting this. It's exactly what I needed. And for those of you who've never used this set up it's all you need. There's actually a lot more exercises you can do with them than what's listed so look int that as well. For example, you can hang by your legs from the dip bars and do vertical sit ups. You can also throw a towel over the pull up bar, twist the towel to make a rope of sorts and do pull ups called "grippers" or "clenches" just by only holding onto the towel. You can also do leg lifts while on the dip bars. That's just a few extra I know. There's many more.