Mounting the Rings thread (Photos & Answers)

[Ace]

If the drill needs alot of pressure to progress and go deep that means that is hard enough, at first i didnt have the confidence and used to check if the bolts have descended , but its all good now!

[John Prink]

Ten years ago I crashed a car and nearly broke my neck. I've been living with herniated discs in my neck ever since, which make it nearly impossible to press weights and do most weight training related exercises without pain of some sort. I've learned to live with it. I still weight train, mainly leg and heavy pulling movements. Pushing movements I use rings....I also do lots of pull ups and chin ups.

I started back on ring training and have been relearning some skills, but at 46, some of those skills are more difficult than others. I keep at it though.

Don't quit....my advice to anyone with injuries is do whatever you can and exploit it to the max. Get extremely good at those exercises. Avoid what you cannot do.

I attached my rings to the top of my power rack chinning bar....works great and its very sturdy.

JP

[Ace]

[kit]

Just got my rings. I'm going to mount them in the garage. The ceiling has sheetrock. My plan is to mount a 4-6 ft 2x6 on the sheetrock and into rafters with lag bolts. I will then screw eye screws into the 2x6 to hold the rings. I'm installing the 2x6 to spread the load across several rafters.

The largest eye screw I could find is 7/8". It is a little longer than the thickness of the 2x6. I will use some washers so i can get it tight with out going to far through the board.

I could go directly into the rafter. However I thought it might be better to spread the load.

Any opinions?

Is the 7/16" eyebolt strong enough?

I have a 5/16" eye screw that is shorter and would not go throught the board, but it doesn't look strong enough.

Any help would be appreciated.

Kit

[admin]

Your plan with the 2x6 sounds like it will be more than enough to do the job. But it never hurts to go a bit overkill. Please post some pics when you have the setup completed.

Tyler

[Aeroplane]

Materials:

1 - 5' 2x6
9 - 4" 3/8 drive lag screw
2 - 2" ring/plate hangers
8 - 2" #12 steel bolts w/nylon lock washers

Installation:

Finding the joists was a challenge. Due to the rough texture of the ceiling and the fact that 99% of stud finders don't work very well anyways, finding the joists wound up being somewhat like divining water with a branch. In the end, I had to take guesses and drill several holes. No big deal though because the beam covers them and they can always be filled later.

Make sure you have a drill bit long enough to predrill for the 4" lag screws. You do not want to just run them in raw. Also, at least on my ring/plate hangers, I had to drill out the mounting holes for the #12 bolts as the predrilled holes were slightly too small.

I first measured the 5' 2x6 and set the ring/plate mounts 3' apart with 1' on each end. I chose 3' as a compromise between close-body and wide-arm exercises so the ring straps don't have too much angle on any given exercise. I predrilled for the #12 bolts and fastened down the ring/plate hangers, the nylon lock washers being on the side of the 2x6 that faces the floor. I then screwed the 2x6 into three independent joists (make sure you find the center of each joist) with three 4" lag screws per joist. Once that was done, I ran the ring straps through the ring/plate mounts and that was that. Each ring holds my entire weight independently with no problems. They feel extremely solid.

[EmanP]

Where does one find ring/plate hangers? I went to 3 different places today with no luck. Spent some time trying to find them online without luck either. I simply don't trust eyebolts to hold the weight especially while yanking on them. Not to mention every one I looked at had a warning not to use them for what I want to use them for.

[roman]

Where does one find ring/plate hangers? I went to 3 different places today with no luck. Spent some time trying to find them online without luck either. I simply don't trust eyebolts to hold the weight especially while yanking on them. Not to mention every one I looked at had a warning not to use them for what I want to use them for.

The only thing you need to make sure of is that the bolts are thick enough. The thicker they are, the more weight they can hold. I used Hook Bolts and drilled them right into my concrete ceiling, and I assure you they are *extremely* strong. My current weight is around 82Kg, and I've been doing weighted dips/pullups on my rings with up to 38Kg (totaling at ~120Kg, which is about ~265lbs) and they held out fine ever since I first installed them, which was probably over a year ago already.

You can find photos of my setup here:
viewtopic.php?p=9421#p9421

[roman]

I merged together a couple of the main posts on the forum on the topic of mounting the rings and put them on "sticky" for convenient access. If anyone has any questions on mounting their rings, you'll probably find your answers here. If not then post your questions on this thread...

[EmanP]

If you had to drill into a 2x4 for a regular non-concrete ceiling, would the eybolts have enough 'thread' to not rip out of the wood? In looking at the various bolts in stores, the threads do not look they they are wide enough to bite into the wood. Has anyone also had any problems with damaging the sheetrock surrounding the holes in the ceiling? I don't want the surrounding material to be compromised.

[Aeroplane]

Where does one find ring/plate hangers? I went to 3 different places today with no luck. Spent some time trying to find them online without luck either. I simply don't trust eyebolts to hold the weight especially while yanking on them. Not to mention every one I looked at had a warning not to use them for what I want to use them for.

I bought the ring plate hangers at Home Depot. There were two different aisles with possible equipment choices so make sure to have a thorough look around.

As for using eye bolts, I could not say for certain how stable the hold would be. There are many variables to consider aside from the properties and quality of the eyebolt, itself. Thick bolt threads means almost nothing if you're screwing it into balsa wood. And not all ceiling joists are created equal. If you only have one support point for a ring, it had best be a strong one. If you take a look at a piece of lumber at the hardware store, you'll often see flaws and small gaps in the wood. Since you can't see what you're drilling into, going through ceiling drywall, you never know if you're hitting one of those weak points. This is why I think it's best to have the load distributed over multiple support points.

Another factor is what kind of motion you'll be involved in on the rings. If you have any angle on the straps, then keep in mind that the force is not pulling only straight down; it's also pulling side to side. Over time, this rocking of the bolt will stretch and tear the grain of the wood. It might take 6 months to fail or it might take 100 years. You don't really know. So best to be safe - especially if you plan to be inverted on the rings for any exercises.

I certainly wouldn't say that eyebolts can't do their job - they may work just fine. But I chose to go a different route.

[speedy]

KCE,
The thing about that setup using the removable pull-up bar doesn't make sense to me. A Power Rack okay, but even then why? See I know from a gymanstic perspective the need to use rings, and I love my rings; but like you showed in an apartment which I now live in one myself, since I don't have the room nor the place to hang the rings I use the removeable pull-up bar and just that. Why put rings on that?

[KCE]

KCE,
The thing about that setup using the removable pull-up bar doesn't make sense to me. A Power Rack okay, but even then why? See I know from a gymanstic perspective the need to use rings, and I love my rings; but like you showed in an apartment which I now live in one myself, since I don't have the room nor the place to hang the rings I use the removeable pull-up bar and just that. Why put rings on that?

Mostly I use them for dips, flys, etc. pretty much all the push exercises, although I prefer to use them outside since you have more room, but I can do almost everything inside.

As for the original topic, like aeroplane said, mounting them at an angle should really be taken with precaution and if you do multiple joints will help reduce the force on each individual joint. One more thing I'd like to add is the longer the screw/thread the better.

[ceo]

Hi Guys,

I'm extremely new to ring training but i'm very excited about the possible benefits of the rings! I finally installed the rings in my apartment after reading the installation tiscussion board and thank you all for the great ideas. My uncle who is an all round handy man assured me that mounting the eye bolts to one of the ceiling support beams would be extremely safe. Finding the beam actually wasnt that hard. I tapped with my nuckle until the feedback was solid and not hollow. My first drill hit the beam and I drilled an inch to either side to gauge the center. I used the eye bolt\carbiner idea and twisted the eye bolt into the ceiling joist with a 12 inch wrench. I applied some dish soap to the eye bolt screws to make it easier. The drill bit we used for the pilot whole was probably not big enough so it made it harder to get the bolt in but its probably more secure. Once I finished the last rotation of the eye bolt i was convinced that this setup will be very secure. I was able to test all my body weight (165 lbs) on one ring without any sign of weakness. Sorry I dont have the specs for the eye bolts i used but i can look it up if anyone is interested or any other details.

[roman]

lol dude! Could you possibly have submitted an even bigger photo?! I had to download it to get it to fit on my screen...

Anyway, your setup looks good! How wide are the rings apart though? Should be 50cm... looks like it's a bit more than that from the photo, but it might just be the angle.

As for the strength, I have hook bolts drilled into my concrete ceiling, and they're extremely strong. I did dips on my rings with an additional 38Kg of weight and they held no problem. I was around 76Kg at the time, so that's 114Kg overall (~251lbs), but I'm sure they can hold much more than that.