Body solid Multi-Station 210lb Dual Weight Stack Machine

First off…I love this home gym. It’s solid, well built heavy duty and the heavy steel frame makes for such a quality gym. I was familiar with body solid products because I owned a smaller unit without the leg press a few years ago so I had no hesitation in buying another one. Once the gym is all put together it’s a fantastic machine. It looks it too!! Now the downside…assembling this is painfully slow and tedious! There are lots and lots of parts you need to figure out where they go and what bolt you need for that part. It took me 4 days to assemble. Now I’m not wylie coyote super genius but I’m not Elmer Fudd either!! I had a difficult time following the blow up diagrams. There are no directions at all. There is nothing that says take part xyz and attach to part abc using 3 inch bolts. Noting at all like that. It’s all blow up diagrams and you need to study them constantly!!! It got annoying and somewhat frustrating very quickly. The build directions are just detailed schematics and it’s very easy to get confused with looking at a small detailed diagram. Just read the other reviews. Many people complain about the assembly. With that said…it’s a great machine. It’ll probably outlast me and it’s still worth the money and time to build.

This Gym is the real deal! Solid and built with no compromises! Some have complained about the instructions, but I think they were sufficient with diagrams that show how it all goes together. A picture is worth a thousand words, and if you tried to explain how to put this size of a project together by worded instructions, you would definitely confuse some people, especially if it were done by someone with ESL language skills. Second, you would need a lot of wording and that in itself would turn a lot of people off. The diagrams are simple and you need to study them carefully while assembling the gym. Here is my experience and advice if you want to put this thing together like a pro. My wife was telling me to hire someone, but I’m glad I didn’t. You will have a much better understanding of this gym if you do it yourself. It’s not too hard, but it is a big project. So you need to take your time and work carefully and not expect to put it together in an hour or two. Save yourself a couple hundred bucks!

I needed to put this thing in a room that is 10.5 feet by 12 feet. Not a very big space for this equipment. I already had a tread mill, stair climber, and an inversion table in the same room, all of which I wanted to keep. After looking at all the pictures of the EXM3000LPS gym online of all the different stations on this gym, I decided to put my existing equipment in the corners of the room and the gym positioned in the center so that the gym and my other equipment wouldn’t interfere with each other. Not being too sure of the outcome, I assembled the gym so that it would be able to re-position the gym if there was going to be any problem. If you face a similar problem of not knowing how exactly you want this gym to be positioned, then you need to follow the order outlined below so you can move the gym before it becomes too heavy.

First, unpack all the boxes that come. Get the instructions (diagrams & parts list) and look them over good. Each part has an identifying letter and number on the parts list, and the corresponding part letter and number labeled on the assembly diagrams. But the parts themselves are not labeled except for colored stickers on some parts that show which section of the frame they are on. Also note that the instructions mention that you have 10 days from the purchase date to register your purchase for warranty service. If you are not ready to put this thing together right away, I suggest you open the boxes to get the registration paperwork and get that done. Not sure whether they would give you any trouble if you were late, but that’s what the instructions say.

So get a roll of masking tape and a fine marker, and unpack all the parts, bolts, washers, frame parts, and identify them and place them in like groups and check the numbers. Measure the diameter and length of bolts and stick the masking tape and identifying letter and number on each group of same parts. One issue I had was there were two parts that I didn’t find, which hold in some round foam pads. I thought they were missing, however, during assembly I found that these two parts were replaced by a single part which goes into the end of a 1″ pipes and holds the foam in place. But here is a note of caution: There are actually two parts shown on the parts diagram which have the same exact description, “01” ROUND ENDCAP” but the part numbers are not on the parts. The only way to tell the difference, which is that one has a slightly larger diameter than the other, is to stack them together so that the larger diameter part is noticeable. I made the mistake of forcing the larger part into the smaller hole and then was left with a part that wouldn’t stay in because it was in the wrong location. And the first part was forced in to where I would have to destroy it to take it out. The smaller part goes on 1″ pipe on the frame and there are two, the larger parts go for the knee bends and there are 4 of them. The pipe welded to the frame have a smaller hole than the knee bend pipes. The foam pads are all the same that are held in by these parts.
After you have identified all the parts and have them neatly laid out around the room where you are assembling this gym, then work on getting the frame together first. DO NOT assemble the weight stacks or any cables and pulleys, leave them for last. Put together all the main frame parts and if you need to adjust the position a bit this way or that, you will be able to push and adjust the gym. But once the weight stacks are in, you cannot move this gym. On the top of the gym where the weight stack poles attach, you can put the bolts in to hold the system together, but do not tighten them until you have assembled the rest of the frame and then put the weight stacks in and tighten everything up.The last thing to do is to assemble the cabling and pulleys. Trust me, you will have to remove cables and pulleys if you try to install them too soon. Take a little time to properly identify the cables. Just like the rest of the parts, the parts themselves are not labeled. But you can determine which ones are which based on the ends, lengths and other details of each cable. And once you have everything else assembled, you can understand which cable is used where better, and they are shown on the diagrams. All the pulleys are the same, except one.
Don’t make the mistake of assembling everything on each diagram in the diagram page order before proceeding to the next. Instead, assemble the frame first, then the seats and all other parts, then the weight stacks, weight stack covers, and last the pulleys and cables together.
I also had an issue with one of the pulleys rubbing on a weight stack cover. I could not adjust anything to give it more clearance so I adjusted the hole in the cover to move the it 1/4″ away from the pulley and it is fine. Not a big deal nor any compromise in functionality at all. But I want it to be quiet and something rubbing would bug me.
You could put this thing together in a day if you begin early and work hard at it. But I assembled it over several days and took my time and enjoyed seeing it come together. It is such a good quality product, I didn’t mind assembling it at all. And when it’s all done, you know all about your gym.
As far as the end cap that I forced in the wrong place, I contacted Body Solid and they sent me 4 replacement parts. The customer support is excellent from Body Solid.
One other issue was that the weights on the weight stacks were sticking on the vertical bars that hold the weights in place and guide them up and down. This was solved by applying a little silicon lubricant, like the kind you use on a treadmill, to the polls. That made everything work smoothly. Don’t use grease or oil since there is plastic bushings inside the weights.
I attached some photos of how my gym fits with my other equipment, and also a comparison photo of the two end caps that look alike and how to tell them apart. The room is 10.5 feet by 12 foot but my wife and I can use all my equipment without any problems. The inversion table folds up against the wall, the treadmill is near the ab station, and the stair climber is in front of the leg press. We even have room for a chair to change shoes on.