2.5kg Concrete Weight Plates (Cast your own)

thingiverse

These are wild times. Along with toilet paper and canned food, weight plates appear to be impossible to purchase right now. If you've been kicked out of your gym and are trying to exercise from home (you absolutely should!), you might find it helpful to create your own weights. I used 50% concrete mix, 30% cement, and 20% sand, which resulted in weights around 2.7kg. Yours may be slightly different, depending on the mix you use. You'll need approximately 280g of filament per two halves. So it's not exactly inexpensive, but still cheaper than what selfish individuals are charging by exploiting the crisis we're facing. Just glue the two halves together, fill with concrete (add some small rocks as aggregate), and when solid, you can cut off the flanges and get started. Or just leave them alone. The shape is a bit unusual, but it's mostly to help the print. The hole is a couple of mm larger than 1" (this is a standard size for home gym equipment). It doesn't require supports if your printer or slicer is okay with bridging. The fill hole is in a corner, so it's not the easiest to fill up. Having it there means it's not unsupported at the top. You'll just have to prop it up at an angle when it's full. If possible, let the concrete dry slowly otherwise it will crack and that can be hazardous. Use two-part epoxy to glue the two halves together. You don't need a lot. The last thing you want is for the two halves to split as you're putting in the cement! As always, use at your own risk. I hold no responsibility if you drop it on your toes. 2nd Iteration: The flanges were larger than necessary, so I reduced them, and they don't need to be cut off, thankfully - it's a lot of work. I thinned the walls slightly - the original was unnecessarily strong and used too much filament. I added four internal ribs. 1st iteration: This is what I printed, and this is what is pictured.