Universal Smith Machine Power Rack Attachment: SMAI Vanta Series Smith Insert Review

I think we finally found a universal Smith Machine attachment. This is the SMAI Vanta Series Smith Machine attachment made specifically for SMAI racks, but they had a lot of thought and the design in making it compatible with everything from 3x3, 5 8th and 1 inch Power Racks, 41, maybe 42 and definitely 43 inch width racks, 28 millimeter bar and a few other features. I'm going to go into shortly some of the things about this, how I've used it, what racks it'll fit on, whether you think this would be a good fit for your gym, so let's check it out.

Hey guys, this is Michael with the Jungle Gym Reviews. Today we're reviewing the SMAI Smith Machine Power Rack attachment, what makes it so enticing. It fits 3x3 racks, both with 1 inch holes as I have here, but also with 5 8th inch holes that will fit both Imperial and metric because of the mounting system they have on the inside.

They also have adapter kits so that you can fit this on different width racks from 41 all the way to 43 and we're going to talk about which specific ones before I get into the video. You could quickly hit the subscribe button below if you haven't already. It's going to continue to help us grow the channel.

Make sure you get notified when we post our weekly review videos throughout the rest of 2025 and if you're interested in purchasing this or any of the other SMAI products after this review, check out that affiliate link in the description below. Main specs about this, this is a gun rack style Smith Machine attachment, meaning it has these little notches all the way down, the plates that mount onto your uprights. The bar itself is a little more narrow than other Smith Machine bars that I've offered, which I actually really like. It's a 28 millimeter bar.

Technically, it's the Imperial equivalent of that. I think one and one eighth inch, very passively knurled, but that's very traditional as far as Smith Machines go because they're never really kind of aggressive. You don't really want that in Smith Machine because you're doing things, you have to twist it, you have to unlock it and obviously has a fixed plane of motion so you don't really need the super aggressive grip. Speaking to the plane of motion, it is just a vertical Smith Machine bar as you'll see here. It has these vertical guide rods. It is on the shorter side when we're talking about overall height, but that was actually a design decision they made because as you'll see, this whole rack is a 91.8, let's say 92 inch SMAI rack.

And you can see it doesn't quite go anywhere near the top. Well, the reason they did this is because they also sell 80 inch version of their 3x3 Power Racks, which are perfect for basements. And they want this attachment therefore to fit both the 80 inch racks and the taller 92 inch racks. One suggestion I would have for SMAI in the future is I honestly wish they would sell two different versions of this, both of the short version and the tall version. I could go another about foot up in space and then have another foot of Smith Machine guide rods.

I could then do things like standing overhead press or a number of other things, maybe make some really tall people happy for calf raises. But the big thing I will say as you'll see here in the highest setting, this is pretty much dead center of my skull and maybe a danger to myself and my family. The highest setting just happens to be my head height.

As you can see here, there's been at least three, four times when I originally put this on that I hit my head on this. This is something I would like the ability to have this taller if nothing else strictly for the ability to store out of the way in this taller configuration. The other option I could have here because this is adjustable, this whole section gun rack locking mechanism, I could have moved up to the top of the rack, but then at the cost of losing out on all the lower settings to be able to do exercises with.

Before we talk about the lowest setting, there are actually these safety stoppers built in, which is a really easy and nifty idea that I haven't actually seen. One peg for you to lift up on, you simply just rotate it out and it can slide anywhere up and down the guide rods for any height setting. You do have to leave it locked in the bottom setting because if you turn it like this, then this peg you used for lifting will now hit your weight plates once the Smith bar is engaged on the other side. If you do want to use the lowest setting again, you do need to just quickly unlock both of these, put them all the way down to the bottom, lock them in and you are good to go. So, one of the downsides of other similar type of Smith machines like the recent GitRX Tornado Smith Machine Attachment that I reviewed is that it potentially doesn't go low enough because of the stopping system.

SMAI did not go with the springs for like a damping, they just simply used a very thick rubber stopper. It does give you a little more height clearance because now as you'll see when I stand behind this, it's close to being where a traditional bar would be for deadlifts. I definitely still need some sort of little prop up. As you'll see from some of the footage, I use some extra slant stacks that I have, especially for things like RDLs or for calf raises or sometimes even for rows, just to kind of give me that extra range of motion.

Again, it mounts in the lowest setting, which puts the bar at its lowest at about 16 inches to the center of the bar. As far as how well the Smith Machine works, there's not a whole lot that can go wrong here to be quite frank. It's linear bearings on this bracket, which is mounted to the Smith Bar. The sleeves, I don't know if they have bearings, but they do rotate. I think it's just free rotating on the interior shaft. It feels very balanced from left to right, very even. I don't have an issue with one side getting tilted higher than the other. It honestly just feels very normal, very traditional for a Smith Machine, which is good.

That's what it should feel like. So things like squats, bench, seated military pressing, you name it. This is perfect for, as you'll see here, I have the SMAI Vanta series half rack, and this is mounted on the front of my half rack. Now, the only problem with mounting the Smith Machine attachment to the front of your rack is then you lose out on the ability to mount a barbell because you can't actually even put a barbell in these gun rack holes because they will hit the guide rods. If you want to use the front of your rack for barbell exercises, you basically have to have a six post rack, which is actually kind of what this attachment is geared for in the first place, that you would do your barbell work on the front side. This would go on the inside, or honestly, you can do it vice versa. I could actually, if I didn't have the plate storage built into the back here, this could go on the back posts as long as it fits underneath the crossmember, which for this height it does. Maybe for the 80 inch version it would not.

So obviously this fits on SMAI racks, which have an interior width of 42.7, 42.5-ish inches. And I mentioned this is universal. How did they do this, you might ask. As you see, there's a lot of welded parts and fixed things on the bar here. So the bar itself does not move or expand, but what they've simply done is made this adapter kit, which are these thick steel plates that are a little over a half inch, I believe 15 millimeters, which is like 0.6 inches. And these actually mount to your current rack cross members to expand your rack. Let's say you have a rep PR5000, this is a 41-inch interior width rack.

If I tried to put this Smith machine on it, it simply wouldn't fit. These adapter plates they sell so that they would simply just slide in between the front crossmember 41-inch plus basically a half-inch plus a half-inch. Again, a little bit more 1.2-ish inches, which would then put it within the tolerances to make this system fit on. So again, this fits on SMAI racks. They've done a good job with their website to list some of the compatibility. It is compatible with rogue racks, which are 43-inch as well as bells of steel.

Anything 43-inch will fit natively with no adapter kit. And the cost for that is $999. If you do need an adapter kit, I believe it's $1,000 and about $50. That includes adapters to expand your rack. So again, 41-inch racks, that's going to be the rep PR5000, PR4000, or a SOARnext rack, for example. They have more compatibility on their website. And if you have a rack that hasn't been mentioned, they're super great about helping you.

So just send them an email. So just know, again, the BAR system itself does not expand, but rather you have to expand your existing rack by putting these shims slash adapter plates in there. Now, the downside to that is if you have a cable system that already is pre-selected for the high-degree rack, for example, if you do have a wrap Aries, which I'll have coming soon, if you wanted to then add these, it might actually not work because of the specific cable length.

Granted, there's usually enough adjustments or play. They don't guarantee, and obviously I can't guarantee, that if you have a cable system that's specifically dialed in for your rack and you want to use the adapter plates, that then this Smith machine would fit. But just talk to them or even leave a comment down below and I'll try to help you figure that out as best you can. As you'll notice, I did not mention a 42-inch rack. I mentioned 41 with the adapter plates and 42.7 and 43-inch natively. Now, a 42-inch rack is not guaranteed to fit, but in theory it should. Rather than putting a spacer plate on both sides, like this Titan Fitness Titan series, you would hypothetically only put it on one side, which might look a little weird to you, but I'm sure no one would notice and then would take the interior width of this 42-inch Titan rack to 42 plus 0.6, which would essentially put it at 42.6, 42.7, which is the same distance as the SMAI, which would then make it, in theory, compatible. So overall, price considered, I think this is a great idea and I appreciate that SMAI is self-aware enough to realize people aren't going to buy a whole new rack just to get one specific Smith machine attachment in it.

So the fact they're trying their best to make this obviously fit their rack based on their design, but then also think of the things, hey, how can other people just buy this as a standalone, fit it to the rack they currently have? The other consideration I like about this Smith machine attachment, you have plenty of elbow clearance. Now, with the GetRX version I have that have the little stopper pegs that stick out about a finger's width, two to three inches, when I am pressing, especially military pressing, my elbows come very close, if not hitting those. This gun rack style does free up the space a little bit. So even if you're six foot two with lanky long arms, you have plenty of clearance, unless you don't center yourself well in the middle of the bar.

Other than that, I think the real big benefit of this is the fact that it goes natively pretty low compared to other Smith machines. I think the bolt fitness one that I tested in the past was about the same height as this. The GetRX one that I reviewed recently was not and it was way taller. The downside to the low height is that when you store it and have a taller rack where you could put it a little higher, this ends up being right in the middle of your noggin if you're over 66 inches or so. But besides that, I've been very happy with this and I think it's a great attachment, especially considering the price, which is about $1,000. So guys, that's it for this review of the SMAI Smith Machine 3x3 rack attachment for 5 eighth and 1 inch racks. If you have any questions or comments, please leave them down below.

I'll be happy to answer or at least try. Thanks for tuning in to the Jungle Dream Reviews. We'll see you next time. Take it easy. Peace.