Beny 808 Oxbridge V-fit Folding Rower

i bought an oxbridge rower and the chain broke , did anybody get the chain fixed ?

The plus points for the Beny rower is that it is cheap, relatively speaking(to Concept2)easy to assemble with good instructions. Simple read out for strokes per minte, disctance covered, timer, calories used and number of strokes made. It has a comfortable seat for long ergs. It does the job and the air resistance feels about right compared to water.I have only ever rowed Concept 2 rowers for about 4 years in gyms so all this to compared to them.

The negatives compared to Concept2 rowers are that Beny cannot be linked to the internet to race with others online and the times on it seem a lot faster than the Concept2, that is my times are about 30% less for a given distance. The resistance cannot be varies as the Concept2 (10 settings) and your training cannot be stored on a memory card. The Beny is also slow to change on its read out as I was doing bursts of 10 sprints, 10 slow pulls and it took 5 strokes to register my faster strokes per minute.

Overall the Beny does the job for good cardiovascular on almost every muscle group but if you are training seriously for competition then you will have to speak nicely to your bank manager and pay approx 5 times as much for a new Concept2. [email protected] best 2k 6mins 37secs, best 500m 1min 23.4secs , these are concept 2 times

GOOD SOLID MACHINE HAD NONE OF THE PROBLEMS MENTIONED IN THE OTHER REVIEW GOOD FEATURES COMFY SEAT WELL BUILT AND GOOD LOOKING NICE WOODEN FOOT PLATES

i took my time trying to find a good priced rower and seen this reduced from £400 to £200 , having bought i have found it to be utter rubbish it's noisey, foot plates are useless and am trying to sell it for £50 in local paper!

The Beny R808 air rower is such a poor performer that the manufacturers should be ashamed about putting it on the market. Buy this rower only if you want something that can sit in your exercise room and look pretty and impressive. As a working rowing machine I have to say it is total junk.

I bought one new for £250 in mid-January 2009 but 4 months later during an exercise session the chain broke free from its housing and so the rower became unusable.

The suppliers were very understanding, although I must say did not express any surprise about what had happened. The duff machine was replaced by an entirely new one within 3 weeks and all went well for a couple of months when the rower started to make metallic grinding/screeching noises on every pull.The inevitable happened in early August 2009 when the chain broke free of whatever mechanism makes it recoil - so once again I was the owner of a load of scrap metal and plastic.

These events happened while I was the sole user of the machine, typically using it 4 or 5 times a week for 20 to 30 minutes per session. I am an 11 stone middle aged male who is not capable of making excessive demands on a rowing machine. In my experience, prospective buyers should steer clear of this machine. So what do I do now? I'm treating myself to a Concept 2.

I wanted to give two zero ratings but your system doesn't seem to allow that.

Very similar experience to the other reviewer. Was so noisy that I couldn't use it without disturbing the neighbours. Computer never worked. Probably got around one hour use after which it broke. I'm thinking about buying a Concept2 now which I have used in the gym but am also considering hiring a water rower to see what that's like.

First one broke after only 2 months (20minutes' use per day). The chain stopped feeding back, the fan cam off its axle, the sensor stopped working, Totally unusable.Replacement one had an odd centre of gravity which caused it to tip on the in stroke. Chain came off the axle 8 minutes 43 seconds into ownership.Anything has to better than this - and yet it looked so nice.

I bought the Oxbridge folding rower and at first, used weighted rowing exercises in the gym, as I thought it would be too easy. It turns out over tens of minutes to be an excellent piece of equipment. Rowing replaced my occasional road running in the winter months. When I went back on the road the four mile runs seemed easy by comparison. It is easy to get caught up in attempts to maintain or beat your personal best time. 20 minutes leaves you breathless and the more your try to move quickly the harder it gets.

The cover on the wheel that the chain runs under was split by the chain and I asked for a replacement from Powerhouse fittness. This arrived free of charge. I've yet to fit the replacement and the original is just wearing down. I now view this as a consumable item.

Use an mp3 player with headphones, in my experience you won't be able to hear the radio.