Rotator cuff exercises

What do you all do for your rotator cuffs? I am always having to take it easy having strained a shoulder a few years back, and I can't seem to get away from it. I do use dumbbells to try to strengthen them, but I still have problems with them.

bump for me - my range of motion is crap. Gotta be from past injurys and just
somewhat woreout. Know and see guys doing those exercises buy I just like to
get in there heavy - thats probably most of my problem - years of that!! Is there
any hope for the sholders?? (good question Saudades)

Bump for info.

doctor told me to stick your arms out straight to your side like in side lateral raises and point your thumbs down to the ground...
then start to move them straight up and down, no rotating
after a LONG while you can move up to 2.5lbs plates, remember the rotator cuffs are very small and it's easy to overstress them
I made this mistake after fucking mine up, went well for 1 month and then jumped into the 5lbs
rehurt the bitch and had to start all over again

I can't even work out shoulders anymore due to the pain it causes when doing them...Like dorian said the rotator cuff are very small and easy to strain, so in between sets I will do a lot of LIGHT weight shoulder/rotator cuff exercises to build up the smaller muscles so they can handle the heavier weight when doing shoulder or chest exercises.

luckily I've never had too many issues, but I do feel pain and popping/cracking from time to time. I try to just keep it light with the shoulder exercises. I do dumb bell raises front/side with semi-light weight and do a lot of incline bench press to strengthen my delts without over-straining them. Luckily I have large delts (from the front at least...rear is kind of lacking) for my size.

I've had 3 surgeries on my left shoulder for rotator cuff problems. For my physical theropy we did all sorts of things.

The ones that helped me the best (in my opinion) were with small weights. Say you're doing your left shoulder. Lay down on your right side and grab a 5lber or so to start with. Keep your elbow tucked in to your left hip. lift the weight and hold for a certain amount of time then drop back down. the key is keeping your elbow stationary. Thumb is up (facing your nose) and the movement is straight up, right about belt line or so.

Doing somthing like a leg-lift, but with your arms instead. laying down, have a small weight and lift the weight about a foot or so off the ground, keeping it up for a particular amount of time. You can do this; thumb facing body, thumb up, and thumb away (away if you don't have serious risk of subluxation).

I'll see if I can find my paper of routines I used to do when rehabing.

When I got better, the standing dumbell lifts to the front and to the side were good for me. Also, try it across body too, that was a rehab exercise.

Lastly, in a pushup like position, balancing on a ball when you're about at half up/half down. These help to build those small core muscles that we often forget about traing and will make a significant improvement in strength overall.

Thanks to everyone for the tips!