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93EXCivic
93EXCivic MegaDork
1/8/21 9:23 p.m.

My wife really wants a treadmill. I don't know much about them to be honest. Looking for suggestions on what to look for in one. Is their a way to get your milage from one? 

preach (fs)
preach (fs) Reader
1/8/21 9:25 p.m.

When my wife wanted one, I found the best one that I could hang coats and jackets on. I was not wrong as it got used more for that than walking upon...

93EXCivic
93EXCivic MegaDork
1/8/21 9:29 p.m.

In reply to preach (fs) :

I am pretty sure my wife will use it. She used to be a somewhat serious runner. 

secretariata (Forum Supporter)
secretariata (Forum Supporter) SuperDork
1/8/21 9:32 p.m.

Get a commercial grade one if you really expect it to get used. The consumer grade ones will not hold up to regular use for very long.

93EXCivic
93EXCivic MegaDork
1/8/21 9:52 p.m.

In reply to secretariata (Forum Supporter) :

Those are pretty painfully expensive tbh unless I am missing something. Seeing $2k plus for one. 

93EXCivic
93EXCivic MegaDork
1/9/21 7:19 a.m.

Is buying a second hand one off Facebook marketplace a bad idea? 

John Welsh
John Welsh Mod Squad
1/9/21 7:25 a.m.

In reply to 93EXCivic :

Not a bad idea at all. 

Have gyms been forced to close in your area due to covid?

Going out of business sale for pro equipment?

Most residential stuff gets lightly used for 2 months and then sits idle for 5 years. 

Spend some time looking at the FB pictures of the seller.  It should be pretty evident if they were the type of person using it lightly.  

ddavidv
ddavidv PowerDork
1/9/21 7:25 a.m.

No.  I'd actually strongly suggest that.

I bought one off Craigslist probably 6-7 years ago. It is not hard to find one that has been lightly used. As noted above, most become coat racks. You can go through several second hand ones before you ever approach the cost of a new one. With everyone moving to the fancy Peloton style interactive ones I suspect the plain Jane models will be ever more available. I used mine semi-daily for the last five or so years. It's sat since the pandemic as I was walking a lot and now is buried in the midst of some carpentry work downstairs. I set a limit of $150 for a used one and scored mine for around $125 IIRC. Looked barely used.

New York Nick
New York Nick Reader
1/9/21 8:29 a.m.

When the pandemic hit and I was home all the time I bought a Horizon T101. It was ~$700 including delivery. 
When I got it I was running on it and it handled it fine. Lately I am more into walking for a little longer duration and it's been a good machine so far. It's about 6 months old and has a few hundred miles on it without problems. 

newrider3
newrider3 Reader
1/9/21 8:50 a.m.

Check for used equipment or sports consignment stores in your area, my wife has been getting stuff from Play It Again Sports and they have good deals on commercial grade equipment often. 

The homeowner grade cheap treadmills will certainly be functional, but an avid runner will notice the quality difference. They have a lot of flex and bounce in the frame/deck since they're built lighter. The motor and controls are cheaper, so there's less fine speed control and you will notice the motor bogging easily. A complaint my wife has about our cheap unit is that changing the speed up or down is very slow and unresponsive, making it hard or impossible to do certain training programs.

But, we've had the cheapo for four years or so now, and it still works just fine even after being used close to once a week on average.

914Driver
914Driver MegaDork
1/9/21 9:22 a.m.

I know they're a nice place to hang freshly ironed shirts ......

They can be fairly readily turned into belt sanders...

Riley_88
Riley_88 New Reader
1/9/21 9:50 a.m.

Buying used worked out really well for us.  15 years ago when our first kid came along my wife wanted one to make it a little easier to keep running.  Like others above I assumed it would be a coat rack.  To my surprise she used it a ton and really enjoyed it.  We bought it for $300, never had a single issue with it and sold it a few months back for $350 within an hour of posting it for sale.  Buying used allowed us to buy a much better quality unit than we could have bought new.

secretariata (Forum Supporter)
secretariata (Forum Supporter) SuperDork
1/9/21 12:08 p.m.

In reply to 93EXCivic :

As others mentioned used 1-2 year old commercial grade stuff can be very cost effective. That's what we did. Got it online from some place that specialized in used gym equipment. They had good descriptions & photos of their inventory. I think we paid about 40% of new, including shipping. I spent about 50 minutes per day, 5-6 days per week for 8 years or so at a fast walk (just short of running about 3.2-3.3 mph). Need to clean it off & get my @ss back on it...

Jesse Ransom (FFS)
Jesse Ransom (FFS) UltimaDork
1/9/21 12:23 p.m.

The worst part about buying one off of CL was that it was awkward and heavy.

Only bummer with our Precor 9.23(er... .25?) is that the built in heart rate system is useless, and Precor support told us it would work with a cheap Polar heart rate strap, which is only true of the otherwise similar 9.27.

triumph7
triumph7 Reader
1/9/21 8:04 p.m.

My only comment... they are heavy as f'ing hell!  Oh, and they do make good clothes racks too.

wlkelley3
wlkelley3 UberDork
1/9/21 9:42 p.m.

If it will seriously be used, look for one that has a wide and long tread. Went through a couple myself and found most consumer ones (the ones that are affordable new) I had problems with the width of the tread and the length of the tread. You know me, I'm not as tall as you. Just under 6ft. But do have bad knees and feet so the wider and longer ones helped keep me from stumbling. Commercial ones meet this. Before this pandemic closed up everything around here I saw that the local Y was upgrading their equipment so maybe those may be on the market, don't know. It has been almost a year since then and SWMBO won't go back to the gym until all this is over.

Downside of commercial treadmills is they don't fold up easily and take more room. So they don't work quite as well to hand your clothes on.

93EXCivic
93EXCivic MegaDork
1/9/21 9:44 p.m.

In reply to wlkelley3 :

Thanks. I'll keep an eye. Mostly for the wife though. I do my cardio on a bike. I personally hate treadmills. 

wlkelley3
wlkelley3 UberDork
1/9/21 9:48 p.m.

With my knees, I prefer recumbent bike myself.

tr8todd
tr8todd SuperDork
1/10/21 7:10 a.m.

I picked up a broken one not long ago for free.  It was local on facebook.  Needed a $3 fusible link piece on the power cord.  Then a couple of months later I had to replace the belt as the wife wore it out.  That was fairly cheap as well.  This is the wrong time of the year to try and find one.  Everybody has that loosing weight New Years resolution thing going on.

93gsxturbo
93gsxturbo SuperDork
1/10/21 8:21 a.m.

Funny you ask - Just went down the treadmill rabbit hole and here is what I found.

  • Used homeowner grade ones are crud - typically low end and either pisspounded or something is broken and parts availability is null
  • New homeowner grade ones are OK for walking and jogging, they dont do well running unless you get to the upper end of the spectrum
  • New homeowner grade ones are on national backorder regardless of the brand.  There are a few floating around but most are out 45-90 days right now
  • Used commercial units can be a crap shoot but at least you know you are buying on the bottom of the curve and you can get parts and service.
  • Folding and home grade units typically do not do well to a man of girth trying to run on them.
  • If you want to run, get a unit with a 60" belt that will do over 10 MPH.  There are units with 50 and 55" belts and also units that top out at 8-10 MPH. 
  • Commercial grade machines cost about 10x what a homeowner machine does for a good reason.
  • Commercial grade and the high end home grade ones need a dedicated 20A 120V circuit.    

For new, I would recommend the most expensive SOLE or NordicTrack you can find.  For used commercial, Matrix, Life Fitness, True, and Precor are going to be some of the good ones.

So what I did was I found the wife a used commercial grade unit.  Hotel take-out, off-lease Life Fitness CLST Integrity with the TV.  Has 12,000 miles on it.  Belt life is 30,000 miles, deck life is 60,000 miles so I think we are good for a while.  Got it for $1,100 which is a fair priced this time of year in Wisconsin.  Brought it home from North Chicago.  If you are in Chicago area, I have a guy...

A few notes about the commercial grade units

Be forewarned.  Its huge.  Fortunately we have the space.  Lay it out in advance.

Its a heavy SOB - 400 lbs.  I got myself and my biggest bestest crossfittest bro and we were able to wrestle it downstairs after significant disassembly.  

The build quaility is impressive.  We had a NordicTrack elliptical followed up by the highest end SOLE elliptical you can get and they were OK.  Lots of plastic in important locations, odd and cheap fasteners, etc.  This unit is a tank.  All grade 8 standard thread fasteners, no metric BS or weird cheap stuff. Really nice trim pieces with the cast-in captured nuts, not just threads into plastic.  There is a keeper that holds the cord in.  There are 6x 1/2" bolts that hold the uprights to the base.  The base is one big weldment, not bolted or other crap.

The other thing I like is the commercial units don't have all the geegaws to attract Susie Q Homeowner.  No bluetooth speakers.  No subscription based programming.  Set it up, plug it in, and go.  

Life Fitness Integrity Commercial Series Treadmill (CLST)

This unit but with a TV above the controls.  

CJ (FS)
CJ (FS) HalfDork
1/10/21 10:36 a.m.

I have a Precor that I purchased about 20 years ago after an *almost* heart attack.  My heart doc recommended it because it was what he and several other doctors he worked with owned.  Mine has been used moderately and has never needed any kind of service.

YMMV

drainoil
drainoil Dork
1/10/21 11:46 a.m.

I had a Sole F80 I bought new. This was a few years ago, paid around $1500 for it at a local retailer.  I did a fair amount of research beforehand before settling on that particular one. Although I usually set it on manual and ran until I was gassed, it did have several programs with varying levels of torture, available. It also came with a heart rate monitor. Oh they also marketed it as a "folding" treadmill, however it didn't quite fold up completely vertical. Being I mostly ran vs walking on it, I gave it a good steady pounding (don't get cute with that :) ) for about 2 years. I wound up selling it (for a good price) not because anything was wrong with it, but rather I just got bored with looking at the same thing every time I ran on it. 
 

Running and biking outdoors has since taken the boredom factor away completely.

dj06482 (Forum Supporter)
dj06482 (Forum Supporter) UltraDork
1/10/21 8:41 p.m.

A bonus of NordicTrack  is that many are iFit compatible, meaning for a newer one, the treadmill can adjust incline, etc automatically as part of the workout.  They offer both canned and live classes. I'd at least look at a demo before you decide, we got it a few weeks ago and it takes some of the boredom out of exercising.

We have an ancient NordicTrack elite that we bought used about 8 years ago, and has held up very well.  They are super heavy to move, so just be prepared for that!

93gsxturbo
93gsxturbo SuperDork
1/11/21 1:08 p.m.

Got the wife's treadmill moved down to the basement this weekend.  See that frame?  100% and powdercoated steel - no plastic there!

Runs really really nice and smooth, very heavy and doesnt move at all even under full tilt boogie.  One thing I did learn - actually remembered - was that these rigs dissipate static thru the ground and between that and a VFD do not place nice with a GFCI outlet.  Had an Oh E36 M3 moment when I hit "run" and it immediately tripped the GFCI.  Fixed that and back to the races.  

So not only do you need a 20A service for these but you also need an outlet with no GFCI.  

 

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