Insert Witty Joke About "Spreading 'Em" Here

If you've been wanting to experiment with keeping yourself or a partner restrained with limbs spread open, but didn't want something stationary like an under the bed restraint kit, a spreader bar set is a great option for you. What makes this particular set pretty great is that it's super easy to figure out and put to use, and anybody of any experience level can use it.

The overall craftsmanship earns a hearty "not bad." The metal bars feel solidly constructed, although not indestructible. They're each capped with a piece of black plastic that lets a chain with a solid ring out on each end. These rings are where you'd clip your cuffs onto. The cuffs feel pretty solid as well. They aren't the prettiest things out there, but they're good enough that you'll be able to tell if you like being restrained. Everything comes in a nice canvas case and even includes an extra little blindfold. The blindfold is pretty cheap, but works adequately. It'll fit heads up to about 26 1/2" around comfortably.

The longer bar is a total of 24" long. It has a total of 4 rings where you can clip on a set of cuffs, approximately every 8" down the shaft. The shorter bar is 10" long and has a total of 3 rings, although the one in the middle has a strap attached to it. The strap is adjustable and made of black nylon webbing and can be a total of about 16" away from the bar. At the end of the strap is a hook like you might find when attaching keys to a belt loop and that attaches to a collar that you can change out.

The collar and all 4 of the cuffs are made up of neoprene, velcro, and nylon webbing. The collar is just over 2" tall and has about 17 1/2" of neoprene before you have to fill space with the 6 1/2" velcro strap. It will also wrap around itself if your neck is smaller than that, although you may end up with the flap underneath poking out with a little bit of movement. The velcro seems to hold just fine for all of it, but it's something to keep in mind. It also features a metal D ring. The wrist and ankle cuffs are also just over 2" tall, but the wrist cuffs are 10 1/4" long and the ankle cuffs are almost 12" long, and both have a long enough velcro strap that you can exceed those measurements. They each feature a D ring with an attached clip, so if you want to use different cuffs with the bar you'll have to get new clips.

There are a number of different ways you can use this set. Since the cuffs remove, you can put them on any of the rings you want. You can use the long bar to put all the cuffs and have the wrists and ankles on the same line. You can attach the collar to one end of the long bar, the wrist cuffs to the two middle rings, and the ankle cuffs to the bottom ring. Secure it behind the restrained person and they're now hog-tied. The short bar can be used similarly, and the possibilities really are endless. If you have an under the bed restraint system that didn't restrain you quite as much as you want (like ours), you can use the bars to keep you spread a certain amount and restrained to the bed.

There wasn't much to the packaging, and I'm rather happy about that. Everything came inside of the nice canvas bag, and there was a small tag attached to it somewhere I believe. The inside of the case is lined with what feels like vinyl, and an included lock lets you lock the zipper pulls together if you want. It is pretty much what you might find on a cheap diary, so it can easily be broken into, but it's enough to keep casual snoopers out. It's overall an extra inch or two longer than the longer bar, and can easily be traveled with.

In general this should be a fairly low maintenance set. If you get anything on anything, I'd wipe it down with a damp cloth and then dry it. If the cuffs get really scuzzy you can hand wash them in the sink and then let them dry out for a few days before putting everything away back in the case.

I toyed around with the idea of a spreader set for a while, especially after we got our under the bed restraints and I felt less than restrained with them. It didn't take long to figure out that a spreader bar would probably make that experience a lot better, but it took me a while to get around to getting this set. I'm beyond happy that we own this, really. It may not be the best set out there, but for the money and what comes with it and what we can use it for and how long I think it'll last us? I'm really happy. It's probably not going to be the piece that an advanced user is going to lust after, and it's a bit expensive to just be a one or two use item. However for those who want something easy to use for light use, it should last a long time.