Homegym Vault Europe

Summary

At a reasonable price you get great quality and functionality, cool features and lots of customization. And if you only want the great quality and functionalty, Fitron does sell a more basic version at 299€ – As for the Fitron Cambered Swiss bar, I find it difficult to recommend any imported open trap bars at this price, unless you really want to save those last 20€.

• Price: 335€ without sleeves, starts at 449€ with sleeves
• Weight: 30, 32 or 33kg
• Sleeve length: 177, 206 or 220cm
• Axial distance between handles: 63cm
• Rated for: 600kg

Design and Features

Similar to its cousin, the Fitron Cambered Swiss Bar, this open trap bar has one the best interchangeable sleeve systems that I have ever seen. It takes 10-20 seconds to change a sleeve, and the sleeves can be exchanged between Fitron’s two speciality bars to date. So, you do not need to pay for sleeves twice. Additionally, the high set of handles come in 3 thicknesses – 32, 35 and 38 millimeters.

As seen below, the lower set of handles are not customizable and they do not have any knurling. According to Fitron this was done since almost no people used the lower set of handles in product testing. They therefore chose to focus on the set of handles that people were using. In my own experience, I almost exclusively use the lower set of handles for lunges where grip is usually not a limiting factor for me. But, for some this might be an important detail to keep in mind.

As you would expect from any open trap bar this bar has a built-in jack. This means that you can tilt the bar up until it stands on its two feet (see picture below). The plates are now 1-2 cm above the ground, and you can therefore add or remove plates very easily. The built-in jack functions so well, that on more than one occation on heavy deadlift days I have switched from regular deadlift to trap bar deadlifts just to make loading and unloading the weight easier. Although, it would be nice if the feet had some plastic material on them, so the bar would be less prone to make dents in your wooden platform.

You can customize the colours of this bar to your heart’s content. The frame comes in 9 different colours. The handles come in zinc, black oxide or stainless steel. The sleeves come in zinc or black oxide. I have my frame in olive green with black handles and black sleeves. The black sleeves will, as all black sleeves do, show some scratches over time. But nothing crazy in my 6 months of owning the bar.

Lastly, some people might prefer rounded profiles on the frame, so they can use the bar for cambered squats. For me, this is not important. But another thing to keep in mind. Skip to the conclusion, if you want links to some open trap bar with rounded profiles.

Functionality

I use this open trap bar 1-2 times a week, mostly for deadlift and lunges. And it has been a joy to use. I often look forward to using it due to the quality feel, rock solid construction and the ease of use. Besides, I love the colours on mine. It is also perfectly balanced which is a nice feature on pulling movement. But more importantly, it makes the bar much more suitable for overhead pressing because the bar is so well balanced.

If you buy this bar for deadlifts, I would suggest that you buy the longest sleeves. On trap bar deadlifts, you can usually lift more than you can on barbell deadlifts. Hence, the 43 cm sleeves will make sure that you will not outgrow your bar after a few years. In regards to the distance between the grips, they are not too wide for me and therefore it does not feel awkward. I am around 180 cm tall and I weigh 90 kg.

Trap bar deadlifts can be a great way for newcomers to practice the basics of the deadlift movement with a starting position that requires less mobility. And contrary to barbell deadlifts, it does not require newcomers to keep the bar close to their shins. They can instead focus on coordinating the hip and leg drive. For more experienced lifters, it can be a great way to practice the quad drive for deadlifts.

As shown above, the bar can also be used for reverse and forward lunges. I personally really enjoy the feeling of open trap bar lunges compared to dumbbell or barbell lunges. In my experience I can load on more weight and I feel more balanced and comfortable.

Price-to-Quality Rating

This bar does costs around 100-200€ more than the cheapest open trap bar available. Currently, the prices on open trap bar in Europe are all over the place. There are imported ones with less features available at both lower prices and much higher prices. And none of the imported ones that I know of have interchangeable sleeves or handles.

But if extra features are not important for you, and you just want a functionally very solid open trap bar, I think you should check out the regular Fitron Trap Bar OPEN (see the picture above), which only costs 299€. At this price, I simply do not see any real competitors in regards to price-to-quality except for the BLK BOX Open Hex bar. But it is only available in the UK.

In regards to features and build quality, I personally think that the closest competitors to the Fitron Trap Bar Open-X are the REP Open Trap Bar, the Eleiko Öppen and the PRIME fitness Open Trap bar. The latter two are much more expensive than the Fitron bar, and the REP bar is currently only available in the UK and it is imported from China. And I do believe that if you buy fitness equipment from China, you should expect to save money (btw REP Fitness are working on getting a distributor in Europe)

Conclusion

I am still very satisfied with this purchase after 6 months. I think that you get a bar made in Europe with some great features, supreme build quality and the option to customize it at a very fair price. And if you just want to maximaxe the functionality/price ratio, I would look towards the more basic version of this bar that Fitron also sells.

If rounded profiles on the frame are important to you, I would recommend that you look towards the open trap bars by REP, BLK Box, Sqmize, LMZ, PRIME Fitness or Eleiko – depending on your budget of course. If money was not a limiting factor I would go for the PRIME Fitness Open Trap Bar. If I wanted the cheapest imported trap bar with rounded profiles I would go for the BLK Box or the Sqmize.

I hope this was helpful!