The gym that works your muscles before you even get it out the box! (Weider Flex 8960 Multi Gym)

Member Name: rachpirt

Product:	Weider Flex 8960 Multi Gym
Date:	31/01/08 (758 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great piece of equipment, versitile

Disadvantages: A scarey prospect when you get all the components outof the box

I happen to love my gym; I really like it a lot. I purchased it back in November from EBay for £139, and I think it is worth every penny! You have probably seen the review of my treadmill, well I can tell you now that the multi gym is the thing that I look forward to.

--Getting the Gym--

I opted to get this online as I didn't fancy trying to carry anything like this from a store to my car with little Tom in toe. I knew it would be heavy and I was right! The gym came in three very heavy boxes which lived in my hall way for a few days until all the bits had been assembled. Luckily the delivery guy felt sorry for me so he helped me get it into the house!
Seriously though, you really have to be careful when moving the various parts to the right place in the house, I had to take breaks just because of the amount of lifting involved. I suppose you get a work out before you put the gym together.

--Assembly--

The assembly of the gym is possibly the worst, most dreaded part of the whole experience. I will not list every item that was in the box as I will be here forever. However, what you get are all the nuts, bolts and washers known to man, the components for the gym, weights etc. the instructions which were actually very well written and thought out. Lastly a poster with examples of different exercises and what muscle groups they work is included.

At this point I would say that you will need two adjustable spanners, lots of space to spread everything out; preferably somewhere that you will not be interrupted by pets or children and where you can leave everything unattended whilst you take a break. My spare room was ideal! You will also need someone to hold a few parts at certain points to ensure the item is put together safely

So, I got to work on the gym. Once I got started it wasn't too bad, it took a total of 6 hours. However I had to do this over a few days as I had to wait until my baby had gone to sleep for the evening. If you had a day where you were not interrupted this would be a bit quicker because you wouldn't have to stop and start.
As there were many bolts and nuts of similar size, they did provide a guide for these which I referred to a lot. There was also quite a bit of lubrication required on various parts which was a little messy.
I wouldn't recommend this item to someone with little experience in DIY to put together, it was tricky and fiddly.

--How the Gym Looks --
I think at this gym compared with others that I looked at in shops is fairly compact. The dimensions are as follows; height 191cm, width 102cm which is comparatively narrow and length 198cm when the seat is down. When the seat is upright for storage it is 100cm. It does not look as good as other models I have seen but seeing as it is in my spare room I don't really mind! It does have a look of the 80s about it but this does not bother me.

-- Using the Gym --
I think this gym is very user friendly and does all the exercises that you would want it to. The extended seat folds up which is good for space saving. It has a lateral bar which can be detached from the top weight pulleys. These also double as individual hand pulley weights. The pulleys at the bottom can either be used from the base of the unit for rowing exercises or they can be attached to the foot bar for calf and thigh exercises. The bench has four settings depending on the exercise you want to do. The seat can move back and forth therefore or can be put into four fixed positions. The back rest for the seat can either be used against the main column of the machine. The backrest can also be used flat or can be detached.

The weight stack is very easy to use and had a pin so that you can select the amount of weight you pull. The weights move nicely and quietly on the weight stack, I have never woken my son up yet and he sleeps in the room next door!

It does take a bit of getting used to when attaching the pulleys to the part of the machine that you want to use. However you soon learn to work on one part of the machine for two different exercises before moving on.

I find this machine easy to use and I really enjoy using it. It is useful to be able to refer to the poster so that you can target specific muscle groups. You also get cardio vascular and strength exercises from this machine too.

I think that this gym is very good value for money!

Summary: Well worth the effort to put it together, This is NOT a clothes horse or dust gatherer in my house!!