Weight is weight, right? Your plates should add weight to the bar; that’s their job; it’s not rocket science!

But what if I told you your sloppy, 45lb plates you got for your 16th birthday from the local big box store were lying to you? The process of casting molten hot iron into moulds can be fickle.

Cast plates manufactured without proper quality control protocols can have as much as 4lbs weight variance, meaning you might have 41lbs on one side of the bar and 48lbs on the other side; leaving you prone to injuries from imbalanced bars, or even worse, finding out at your competition that you are 10lbs weaker than you thought, and missing the gold medal!

Our new machined iron plates are cast in a specialty casting factory with over 40 years of experience, then finished on a lathe that shaves of excessive weight from the back of the plate, followed by polishing and machining edges for an even smoother, more aesthetic plate.

The machined plates are a guaranteed tolerance of +/- 1% for 45, 35, and 25 and +/- 3% for 10, 5, 2.5. However, in our strict quality control and inspection, most plates are under that tolerance, and many fall within 10 grams of the claimed weight.

But we don’t stop there; the holes of the plates are cast smaller than the Olympic bar sleeve diameter of 2 inch/50mm and is then drilled out with a guaranteed precision hole fit of 50.5mm +.4mm tolerance, meaning your plates fit snug and erect on your bar.

Finally, the plates are smoothed, and any excess dirt/dust is flamethrowered off before being finished with an ultra-durable hammertone powder coat.

This additional precision work makes for a more expensive (albeit worth it!) weight plate. If you’re looking for excellent quality but a less precise plate, be sure to check out our mighty grip iron plates.