Zinc pull-up bar?

[Anders Jensen]

Will a zinc pull-up bar be better than a normal pull-up bar?

[Peter Villa]

In my opinion, they are hindering you. Better on your hands, yes. Hence barbells are sometimes coated with zinc. They allow for an easier grip.

But until zinc becomes a Regionals standard on pull-up bars, it will hinder you when you go to a regular pull up bar and can't hold on.

Personally, I like bare steel pull up bars. But it hurts me when I go to a regional standard powder coated rig. I have to compensate and tighten my grip.

If this is for a personal purchase, I would purchase the regular ol' powder coated ones. Just my opinion.

[Anders Jensen]

But if I never will compete in the regionals, will a zinc pull-up bar be a better a normal pull-up bar?

[Frank E Morel]

Buy what you can afford. Buy what will keep you doing the movement.

Stuff like this , is really is semantics.

[William Henniger]

We have run pullup bars with all types of powder coat, zinc and of course bare steel.

I asked some athletes to give me feedback last year - Jason Khalipa, Graham Holmberg, Annie Thorisdottir, Chris Spealler and Matt Chan which type they liked best.

Bare Steel was the 1st choice for all except Graham - he chose powder coat

Rogue Text Powder Coat came in second.

This is what we have found from experimenting:

1) Bare Steel - When dry has best bite/grip. That bite over time can cause tears etc if you are doing high rep workouts. 99% of the time you would be fine. Sweat on the bar can make them a little slick.

Bare steel is my choice and is the way I setup my original affiliate. Takes maintenance to keep them from rusting.

2) Rogue Texture Powder Coat - This is what we continue to refine to meet the needs of the CrossFit Games.

The texture keeps your hands from getting full contact to the bar. This generally allows less rips while providing the right amount of grip.

This has been an evolution of things to keep it right. Testing the gloss factor along with the texture % is a tricky deal.

Any/all texture can wear over time.

3) High Gloss Paint - Decent bite but tends to cause rips and becomes slippery real fast when you get sweat on your hands.

4) General Texture - Wrinkle Paint - That all basically depends on the gloss factor(how matte it is) and the % texture. Each manufacturer has their own recipe for this.

5) Zinc - We zinc'd a bunch of different bars and had athletes test them. Most of the results were like High Gloss paint. Depending on how the steel is treated will be how the zinc quality will turn out. It is like holding the non-knurled section of a barbell.

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Hopefully that helps.

Bill

[Matt Thomas]

Bill have you ever tried a soft knurling on a pullup bar?

[William Henniger]

Matt

Yes we have knurled pullup bars but not for CrossFit gyms.

That being said, much of what is getting done is a gymnastic movement and that requires rotation of your hand around the bar.

If the goal is to get as much bite as you can then yes the knurl would do that. Even a very passive center knurl type on a pullup bar will do some work to your hands. Knurl from passive to aggressive is a matter of - depth, pattern and machining quality.

The other interesting thing to consider when looking at this is that most pullup bars are made of pipe. Unless the pipe is very straight the knurl will vary hence you will have rough/passive patches in the knurl.

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My best advice is to anyone is to work on your grip and then you will be ready for any bar you come across!

Bill