Buying Prostyle Dumbbells - A cyberfit rubber dumbbell review

[matt-el]

Part 1
I thought I’d give a review on the cyberfit prostyle dumbbells I bought. I spent a lot of time researching prostyle rubber dumbbells in Australia before committing to these. There were a few questions I had before I bought them that I couldn’t find answered on the net that I thought others might be curious about, as well as some things that came up after purchase.

And for those thinking about dropping some money on prostyles, which are of course a luxury in a home gym, I thought I’d share some of the thought processes and decision making that went into choosing the ones I did. Go get a coffee, this will be a long one…

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Why choose prostyles:

Prostyles are a luxury. But they are also a necessity. Over the years I’ve had many different types of dumbbells in my home gym: the old standard diameter spinlocks, bowflex selectec 1090’s (my GF bought them for me –no hate), and Olympic dumbbell handles.
All of these solutions cost money, and none of them replaced completely the function of a set of prostyles. Everything comes with a compromise, but with prostyles the compromise is money, and space, but not function.
I wanted a dumbbell set that was preset up (so that I would use it more often , and so I could do dropsets etc). But unlike a set of pre-made up spinlocks, for example, I wanted to be able to knee them up in place, and drop if I needed to at the end of a set.

Why rubber?

Working out at commercial gyms I’d always preferred the feel of rubber prostyles over the pancake plates, which probably makes no sense, but functionally I wanted the freedom to drop them at the end of the odd set to failure, which rubber potentially improves on over bare iron.

 

[matt-el]

Part 2
OK, why not ‘one piece’ cast or welded prostyles? Why plates?

Good question. If you are looking at getting urethane dumbbells (which you may when I review some disadvantages below) you may have to go the ‘one piece’ cast or welded route. Force USA dumbbells are one example. Aside from the finish though, users such as GettingBigger (who I believe has some Sam’s Fitness ‘one piece’ dumbbells) shared with me that if they could go back and choose plates instead of onepiece they would.

Why? When a ‘one piece’ dumbbell is dropped (when any dumbbell is dropped imagine it landing not flat, or on it’s end at 90 degrees, but on one end first, or at 45 degrees) it can bend the handle. Once a handle bends your entire dumbbell is stuffed. One 50kg dumbbell can cost you at least $200 to replace. Most people would still use them, but they can feel funny and unbalanced. This holds as well for the finish. Scuff or gouge out some rubber on your dumbbell and again you are up for a new one . With plates if you wantto sell your set and you want it to look Purdy, you can simply replace oneplate if there is an unsightly chip and she’s as good as new. So reparabilityis one plus for plates.

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12.5kg to 50kg prostyles on 3 tier rack

Another is expandability. With fixedDumbbells, you buy a pair, say 42.5’s and you find that you don’t use them as much as you thought? You’ve blown over $300. With plates you can cannibalise them. For a start 42.5’s, 45’s, 47.5’s and 50’s all are exactly the same except for having different weight endcaps. Some goes for all the other deciles as well. For the cost of a pair of endplates you can turn one dumbbell into any other one in that range. They all use the same handles and number of plates. This was actually really useful to know in planning out my rack configuration as well. I didn’t want to go over a 3 tier rack in size. And I didn’t want to have a rack that sat partially empty for years till I needed some 60’s, or have a full rack with extras sitting around when and if I got them. With plates if I got up in weight on my presses I can take an ‘in-between’ weight like 42.5, and turn it into a 52.5, 55, or 60.
37.5’s could be cannibalised too. For this reason I bought a larger pair of handles and an extra few 5 kg rubber weights and the necessary endcaps. This way if Cyberfit ever goes out of business or changes their supplier I can still expand my set without having to have different brands. Which is a) anal, and b) good for resale.
On rack configuration: just a suggestion based off my own routine - the lower weights really waste alot of horizontal realestate. For under 12.5kg I use a vertical rack, and smaller increment weights. I find it funny that people worry about small increments in the large dumbbells, which really only get used for pressing, but then are quite happy jumping up 2.5kg at the lower end.

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[matt-el]

Part 3

Now specifically why the cyberfit ones? Pros and Cons.

Price.
Cyberfit hands down wins on price. Not only do they do rubber prostyles for Trefiddy a kilo, but Steve is a great guy who will work with you and your budget. He’s also happy to sell you parts like handles, endplates ,labels, and rubber plates. I ended up getting quite a bit thrown in.

The type of plates - Configuration:
Cyberfit uses 2.5kg rubber plates and 5 kilo rubber plates, as well as uniform handle thickness (heavy rubber hex have thicker handles than the lighter ones) to make up the dumbbells . Pros and Cons: Compared to Australian barbell Company’s rubber plate prostyles for e.g., these ones have one advantage. If you look on youtube, you may find a video by force USA comparing their ‘one piece’ prostyles to a pair of plate ones. For the plates they purposely chose a configuration that I believe lets the team down – handle plus one large plate each side. If you look at my pictures you’ll see that at no weight do the Cyberfit Prostyles have that configuration. The least number of plates per side is two and they are the same size. With prostyles that have one large plate, or one large plate plus a smaller diameter plate outside it, you end up with too much force that can be transmitted to the interior plate in the event of a 45 degree drop. This means the entire force of the drop is on the inside plate, even if the dumbbell has a smaller plate outside it. I’m happy to try to explain in more detail if anyone requires me to, why this is structurally inferior to the cyberfit configuration where, in a 45 degree drop the outer plate and edge always will hit first.

Type of plates – diameter:
Using 2.5 and 5kg plates has some pro’s and cons. Unlike American prostyles ours seem to use fewer plates. This is good as these are coated with rubber between the plates as well, which could add to size significantly. The diameter of the plates are larger but the overall length of the ‘bell is shorter which makes the dumbbells a good length – too long, and heavy bells not only get in the way on presses, but also become harder to balance on your knees as you ‘knee up’ the bell. These ones aren’t too long at all, but that leads to a small Con – the diameter of the plate can at first be a little big and I found that for the first week or so I was bruising my forearm on the inner plate.

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37.5kg dumbbell with 5kg plates - forearm contacts the inner plate.

On the website the only images I could find that showed the plates and handles well were of the lower weights, so I’ve attached a photo so other people can see this before buying. With time though I’ve adapted and am happy that the overall length of the bells is less because of this.

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20kg dumbbell with smaller 2.5kg plates - forearm doesn't contact inner plates

Other pros and cons. Rubber dumbbells aren’t odourless. They smell like rubber. This lessens quite a bit after a few weeks though, but they still have a rubber smell 4 months later. I don’t notice them now, but if you were sensitive you should be warned. I picked up a couple of the nice quality flecked 15mm floor mats at the same time. They smell more than the dumbbells do, for comparison.
Rubber requires maintenance. After seeing so many people leaving their rubber bells outside on gumtree, I figured if I had them inside that would be all I would need to do. Rubber however dries out. If you want to keep them sparkly like I do, be prepared to put in occasional elbow grease with either a dry or damp cloth. I bought some aerospace conditioner and that has worked well without drying them out. DON’Tuse silicon based rubber sprays! Many car care sprays have silicon in them and will actually accelerate the drying of your rubber.
While rubber plate prostyles are superior I believe when it comes to dropping (certainly comparedto welded one piece ones) the plates do shift a little with a 45 degree drop.This isn’t the handle bending! In fact it probably helps prevent it by transferring the force of a drop from the handle to some shearing that is absorbed between the plates. The result is that the dumbbell may look slightly bent after a few drops, but if you tap it on its ends it’ll actually ‘straighten’ up, realigning the plates.

Any Questions?

 

[gizdawg]

Nice review, thanks.

I must say, they do look the business as well. Good looking set.

 

[Stevecro]

I was looking at getting some, just not sure if the handles are thick enough.

 

[kaz]

Cyber fit are awesome and Steve is a great guy
He is only too happy to help after market also.

I wish he was a site member but [MENTION=895]Shrek[/MENTION]; banned him for spamming.

 

[matt-el]

I was looking at getting some, just not sure if the handles are thick enough.

Thick enough for pressing?
I actually wanted straight handles, not ergos. On the site they used to sell straight as well but they don't get them in anymore - another reason that I purchased extras. While I wasn't happy at settling for ergos I've actually come to like these. Good knurling, not too rough, and not too thick for curls at the lower end. At the upper end I haven't had cause for complaint on pressing (I guess you could use fat grips) and when holding the heavier ones for sissy squats I'm glad of the diameter for my grip.

 

[White_Lie]

Can't say i've ever lifted a dumbell where they felt too thin.
I do use fat gripz for certain exercises but more to stress the forearm/grip than because they're too thin. That said, I don't have huge hands

They look like a good bit of gear, great review too BTW, very indepth!

 

[matt-el]

Thanks for that!
Yeah I'm the same re grip - need all the help I can get, the narrower the better!

 

[Stevecro]

Im like you matt i prefer straight handles that are thicker and have good deep knurling, but that is hard to find in dumbbells. Do the handles get thicker as the dumbbells get heavier?

 

[Shrek]

Cyber fit are awesome and Steve is a great guy
He is only too happy to help after market also.

I wish he was a site member but [MENTION=895]Shrek[/MENTION]; banned him for spamming.

Unban him. I'm sure he's learned his lesson. What was his username?

 

[kaz]

Unban him. I'm sure he's learned his lesson.

I don't even remember his user ID.
I'll try find his post

 

[matt-el]

Im like you matt i prefer straight handles that are thicker and have good deep knurling, but that is hard to find in dumbbells. Do the handles get thicker as the dumbbells get heavier?

No the handles stay the same diameter thickness all the way up. Some cheaper dumbbells like hex actually need thicker handles at the higher weights as they are screw in and/or welded.
The thinner handles at the higher weights may be less comfortable for presses, but they are easier to grip for pulls.

 

[Stevecro]

No I find the exactly opposite. Cheaper dumbbells that are poorly designed have the same diameter handles for the lighter and heavier ones. Common sense says that you need thicker handles on heavier dumbbells as they are mainly used for presses etc, where if the handle is too thin, it really digs in and hurts the hand.

 

[Headley]

Im still interested in making some lead weight dumbells and plates one day lol

 

[matt-el]

Im still interested in making some lead weight dumbells and plates one day lol

That would certainly help cut down on size! Though the constant contact with lead may retard you.. have to rubber coat them
I read a thread once where someone was arguing for depleted uranium dumbbells to minimize size - should have plenty of that coming out of Iraq nowadays...