Bow/Buffalo Bar Experience

Wondering what everyone’s experiences are with buffalo bars. Have some money to spend on something for the gym and really leaning towards one of these. Vulcan and Duffalo are out of the question… Duffalo is far too expensive and Vulcan, not only being a bit more than I want to spend also only has an 800 lb test strength (real possibility of the bar getting loaded with significantly more at some point). So far, here’s what seems to be contenders… would like to hear anyone’s thoughts or any other recommendations. Looking around $330 or less including shipping.

TDS - Westside uses is, so no concern with load capacity. Complaints about knurling but honestly I have no issue with just wrapping with tape. Main concern is that bow seems significantly less than others.

Strength Shop USA Bow Bar - Don’t know what weight capacity is, waiting on IG message follow up to find out. Seems nice, more bow than the TDS.

Titan Fitness Yukon Bar - Price scares me, only $200 and they claim “2000 lb capacity”. Good reviews but again, seems too good to be true.

I think Coop from GarageGymReviews did a review on the Yukon bar. A lot of stuff from TitanFitness seems too good to be true but trust me, I have owned their squat racks, hypers, plate storage, and a hand full of other items. They were all just as good as any other brand in my opinion.

I would recommend you go with the Yukon bar and if you don’t like it, they always give you a refund.

Donnie Thomson is releasing or has kist released a bow bar

Titan has recently made some decent specialty bars. I can tell you their ssb bar and camber are good I’m sure their bow bar is fine.

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The Duffalo (and others replicating it) have about twice the bow compared to a Buffalo bar.

I find that the Buffalo does give the shoulders and elbows a break, and really helped for my last meet prep. I bet the Duffalo would have worked even better though.

The titan one looked pretty good on garage gym reviews. I think that is a Duffalo desgn.

Don’t buy the bison bar. It is trash.

If you find a bit more money, Kabuki has cosmetic defect bars for about 150-200 off. I think you can get the zinc coated bar for about 520 before shipping.

Buffalo is trash compared to Duffalo IMO.

It’s basically a bent bar versus a curved bar if that makes sense.

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Funny enough, I felt like the duffalo bar had too much curve after my time with the buffalo bar.

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I find you need a higher bar placement usually to make it really comfortable. It doesn’t appear to be low bar friendly since you need that much more mobility.

I really like it but like with all things its always up to personal preference.

Yeah, it definitely changes my bar placement. Knurling plays in that too.

[quote=“tasty_nate, post:1, topic:262787”]
Wondering what everyone’s experiences are with buffalo bars.[/quote]

Buffalo Bar

This is a great bar. One of my lifting buddies had it at his gym. I used it for Low Bar Squats and Low Bar Good morning.

The Buffalo Bar feels great on your back with a Low Bar or High Bar Rack.

My buddy moved so I wasn’t able to use the bar any more.

The price of the Buffalo Bar, like you, was more than I wanted to pay.

It’s Too Good To Be True

The quality of the Yukon Bar doesn’t come close to the Buffalo or Duffalo Bar.

Yukon makes cheap equipment; “You get what you pay for.”

The $200 price is about 1/3 of the price of the Buffalo and Duffalo Bar. The quality of the Yukon Bar is 1/3 of the quality, as well.

The Sorinex Ox Bar

I purchased the Ox Bar over two years ago. This is heavy, well made bar. The price is much better than the Buffalo and Duffalo.

Sorinex is know for making quality fitness equipment. That was one of the reason that I purchased the bar.

The main difference is that the Ox Bar does not rotate like Olympic Bars; the Buffalo and Duffalo Bar. That cuts down on the cost of the Ox Bar.

In the Squat and Good Morning, you don’t need or want the bar rotating or moving. Thus, the Ox Bar works great.

Video Information on Ox Bar

The price of the Ox Bar is a little more than you want to pay. However, the Ox Bar is a great investment

Kenny Croxdale

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Any other use for the bar?
I train at home and have a nice SSB. Hard to justify multiple squat/ GM bars for 1 person

It’s closer tona squat compared to the SSB while still gentle on the shoulders. I never squat with a barbell anymore. I rotate between the SSB and buffalo.

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I don’t think I am going to straight bar squat except for the 2 months or so before a meet.

I just have not been able to find a position that my shoulders and especially my elbows like long term.

My gym just got a transformer bar, so I think I’ll try to mimic the weight distribution of a low bar squat with that. Camber bar is also something I am going to try.

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Bench variations
Squat variations

I’ve tried rows but it’s much better to get a cambered row bar.

The axle is far and away the most comfortable bar for Good Mornings (Although the cambered bar is nice for these too), it also is significantly nicer for Zerchers of any kind.

Figured I’d just back here and give comments on my purchase choice.

So… decided to take a gamble and get the Titan Yukon bar. Main reasons, $300 was my purchase limit and all other bars in the price range either had a lower weight capacity (whatever that actually means) and/or had only a very minor bow. For a super wide grip squatter, like a lot of Westside guys, I could see how a minor bow could make a big difference, but I’m more narrow with grip so it was hard for me to justify a bar where the camber would only be about an inch at my hand placement.

That said, I honestly couldn’t be happier with my purchase. First thing I did when I got it was load up 850ish, walk it out and feel the whip. Not quite as stiff as a Texas squat bar but definitely stiffer than any power bar. No permanent deformation even with bouncing it a bit so looks like it will hold heavy weights.

The bow is quite aggressive, which as I said is great for a narrower grip guy like me but does make the bar have a bit of a chambered bar feel. That is, it will sort of rotate forward a bit at the bottom. That said, if this bar is actually “harder” than a straight bar, it’s probably only a 10-30 lb difference on my max. Still feels way more like a competition back squat than an SSB or high bar squat.

Center knurling sucks, but some athletic tape fixes that issue fine.

In one of the garage gym reviews on youtube, it’s pointed out that on some racks the bar will slide out and fall if you load a single 45 on one side. At our gym, this does happen on the hard plastic J-hooks, but not on the metal ones.

If this bar were a couple hundo more than it is, I would probably expect the minor flaws I mentioned to be resolved, but you could literally buy three of these for the price of one Duffalo, so all in all I’m quite happy.

Any yes, it does save the shoulders.

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