How to Make a Simple Standing Calf Machine for Home Use

Q: I want to make a simple standing calf machine for home use. Can you give me some tips on how to do it?

A: Making a decent standing calf machine isn’t easy—and even if you make a reasonable one, it probably still won’t produce results as good as the one-leg dumbbell calf raise. I prefer the latter even in a gym where there are excellent standing calf machines. (A standing calf machine can, of course, be used for one-leg calf raises.)

I recommend that you save yourself the expense and hassle of making an apparatus that produces inferior results to one that requires just dumbbells and a stable block.

Use the block under the ball of your foot to produce a full range of motion, hold a dumbbell on the same side as the leg you’re working, and do one leg at a time—alternating sets.