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62 of 64 found the following review helpful:
 Great small home gym May 21, 2009
By Christopher Marland
This home gym is small and compact. Designed really for general fitness and strength training, not for huge body-building. It needs assembly but that only took me about 4hrs by myself. The only thing I would say is don't follow the pulley installation instructions. Place the cable and pulley on the machine in order of feeding the cable, then tighten the pulley bolts to the machine.
This machine does just what you need as a home-fitness gym. It is compact and both my wife and I find it great to maintain tone without wanting huge bulk. It has 150lb in stacked weight which is fine for your general fitness needs. If you want larger weights then I would buy some free-weights but if you want a decent, well put together home gym that works arms, legs & chest then you can't go wrong with this machine.
27 of 28 found the following review helpful:
Very Good Home Gym - Recommended Dec 05, 2010
By C. F. Hill
"CFH"
The Best Fitness "BFMG20 Sportmans Gym" is a very good, highly versatile piece of home exercise equipment. My wife bought me this for our home gym (aka the basement) and picked it specifically because of the relatively low height of the unit (79"), which just barely fits under the low ceiling. This unit does pretty much everything we want it to do exercise wise, but even though the assembly instructions have apparently been updated since some of the earlier reviews there are still quite a few errors and omissions (I will list the mistakes below so you don't have guess like we did). Here are my observations:
Pros -
+ Compact; relatively small size allows the unit to be placed almost anywhere
+ Versatile; allows for Bench Press, Pectoral Fly, Lat Pulldown, Tricep Pressdown, Leg Extension, seated rowing, curls, and more
Cons -
- Bent Frame; shipped from the factory with a bent frame (not damaged in shipping since the box was in good shape), fortunately it was in a place where a few minutes with a steel bar and hammer could straighten it out
- REALLY Bad Instructions; these are not the worst I have ever seen, but they are up there. Here are the steps that were incorrect in mine:
* STEP 1, Section F - Foot Caps were pre-installed (spent a good bit of time looking for them)
* STEP 2, Section A - Should be TWO 33 (M10x70 Carriage Bolts)
* STEP 2, Section B - Convex End Caps were pre-installed
* STEP 2, Section C - Make sure the THREADED end of the Chrome Guide Rods are installed up (we had to partially disassemble the unit to correct this a few steps later)
* STEP 2, Section F - Should be TWO 33 (M10x70 Carriage Bolts)
* STEP 3, Section B - Convex End Caps were pre-installed
* STEP 3, Section D - Decal was pre-installed
* STEP 3, Section F - Left and Right PVC Sleeves were pre-installed
Omissions:
* Lat Bar; connects to the top cable end using the included Snap Link (9)
* Lower\Rowing Bar; connects to the bottom cable using the included chain (10) and two Snap Links (9)
Misc -
* Assembly took my son and I roughly 3.5 hours
* Having two sets of ratchet wrenches really helped speed the assembly along
* When in doubt, look at the "exploded diagram" on the page opposite the assembly instructions
* Make sure to only finger tighten the nuts until the end of STEP 4
* Lube all the moving parts with WD40 right away
* My order was through "The Fitness Factory" and it shipped via UPS Freight, which delivered it palletized (3 boxes) on a full size tractor trailer (almost a problem on our tiny street)
The assembly hassles aside, this more than meets my needs and expectations in a home gym.
Recommended!
CFH
24 of 26 found the following review helpful:
Good for an old geezer Dec 05, 2009
By R. Howard
"howardoaks"
This is a great machine for those of us who don't want to become too sedentary in the winter months. I am an outside guy but in the winter I spend a lot of time inside. Usually by Spring I am pretty much "stove-up". Hopefully, this will keep me from getting too far out of shape. I have owned it about 2 months and use it about every other night. I have come up with about 10 exercises that take me about an hour and a half to do. I take it easy. I believe if I pushed myself too much it would cause me to exercise reluctantly and eventually lose interest. I am not trying to be a Joe Weider here ya know. If I do get muscles popping out all over that would be okay too. I feel great after a work-out. And that's what it's all about. It should be an enjoyable experience. I usually listen to music while working out. A little Dire Straits, or Who, or anything that will get you "pumped-up".
The reason for the 4 star is the instructions. As was mentioned in another post, you do not want to follow the instructions on the pulleys. You'll just wind up taking them all off again to get the cable ran. Also, there are end caps that are supposed to go over the nuts. These caps only fit about 1/4th of the nuts on mine because the bolts come through too far. There was a little bottle that came with mine that said "poison" on it. I don't have a clue as to what was in the bottle because the cap came off during shipping and it was empty when I received it. One last thing, they should tell you in the beginning that you need silicone spray for the guides. The guides on mine were dirty or gritty or something and the weights would get stuck. This could have been dangerous because they would all of a sudden fall after being stuck. After using the spray they work great.
Everything is fine now and I consider this a good purchase. Bring out the charge card and get you one for Christmas. They are cheaper now than when I bought mine. So now you got a deal. Merry Christmas.
20 of 24 found the following review helpful:
 Missing and wrong parts Feb 01, 2010
By J. Miller
Product is OK after some adjustments. The rating is not for product which would get a three star rating but for combo product and service from seller.
Unit is made more for a smaller person - range of movement for exercises is limited but still ok.
However, the unit was shipped with wrong weights and a lat bar that does not fit with the hardware sent. I received proper weights after threatening through Amazon but I have not received the lat bar....over two months. Time to threaten again
8 of 9 found the following review helpful:
a good home gym Nov 06, 2009
By Matthew K. Merkel
"Chenzen"
I have been using this gym for about three days now and so far i am very pleased. This is a great gym for someone just starting out. the cables are quiet , the only sound i really hear is from the plates moving up and down. Took about four hours to put together with only two tools and the directions are great. Just lay out all the hardware (bolts, washers ect.) before you start , it makes things easier. Make sure your phone number is correct when ordering since a delivery service will contact you for a date of delivery.
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