Mikolo Home Gym, Workout Station with 150LBS Weight Stack, Multifunctional Home Gym Equipment, Exercise Equipment for Full Body Strength Training by Mikolo

Bought this machine and it was in my hands in 3 days rather than the 10 days it said. Received every single part without a scratch. I had seen reviews about how hard this home gym is to put together and how it takes 2 people a few days. I was able to put this thing together in 4 hrs with 1 1/2 of that was unpacking and inventory of all the parts and laying them out in the assembly order that book that comes with it illustrated and all by myself. You just need to work smart not hard. Great product and with all the adjustment locations on the machine you can easily make it fit your body size. I’m 6 ft tall and 200lbs I have tweaked the adjustments and it fits me like a glove. Highly recommend this equipment. Nothing out there can touch it for affordability and ease of use.

Not bad for the price. Instructions are fairly simple and straightforward to follow. Great machine, good material, will definitely use for many years.

I find that there are two categories of reviews: superficial “Nice product” and detailed ones that give me useful information. I hope most find that this is the later.

I saw a Costco ad for a home gym and decided I was in the market for a one. Since there were none in the store and there was only one option there, I turned to my favorite on-line retailer and saw that Amazon had several. I narrowed my choices down to five that offered similar features and were in the same price range as the Mikolo so I started comparing them. When I look at ratings, I try to pick out any recurring negative issues and evaluate if they are fussy customers or systemic issues. Things like size, missing parts, flimsiness, shipping problems, and customer support were items I wanted to study. I also considered number of reviews (are other people buying this item?) and overall product and seller rating. I generally won’t buy something that has a rating of less than 4.3 or something that only has a handful of reviews. I ignore tons of positive empty reviews.

Long ago I took a course at work that was essentially “Marketing for Engineers.” I heard of a mantle clock company that sold mantle clocks that were cheaper and better made than the competitor but weren’t selling well. They did a focus group and found that shoppers picked up the clock to see how heavy it was, not something that generally tells you how well it is made or how long it will last. The company’s sales skyrocketed after then added a piece of metal in the base of the clock to make it heavier. While I keep this in mind, I’m not going to buy most things based on weight. In the case of a home gym, I found this may be an important feature. The Mikolo listing said 300 pounds (probably a low estimate since the shipping weight was 346 pounds!). Of the five gyms I looked at, the advertised weights were 314, 300, 220, “your best guess #1” and “your best guess #2.” Considering that all had about 150 pound weight stacks, this means that the 220 pound unit has no more than 70 pounds of steel to hold it up while the Mikolo has at least 150 pounds of steel, closer to 190 when you look at the total shipping weight. In this case, for a 220 pound unit, 70 pounds supporting 150 seems rather flimsy.

After I selected based on features and apparent heft, I looked at shipping times. This varied from 1 day to 6 days. Mikolo indicated delivery in 4-5 days. They actually shipped 1 day after I ordered and it arrived in 3 days.

When Mikolo informed me of the tracking numbers, I was disappointed to see that they were using FedEx. I find that FedEx is among the least reliable carriers. I would have much preferred UPS or Amazon. I was afraid that with four boxes (weighing 70, 86, 92, and 98 pounds) some might be delivered to a neighbor, the next town, or halfway across my property. Fortunately, the FedEx driver did find my house and delivered to my door, although when he tried to hand carry the two boxes with the weight stack to the door, the packing strap on one of them broke. I was glad to see that the weights were sturdy enough to tolerate a three foot fall onto my highway grade concrete driveway with no damage to either.

Parts
The unit consists of 336 parts. I inventoried and sorted everything as I unpacked. All the hardware was nicely shrink wrapped on a cardboard card. Most of the part numbers were easily visible but a few were covered by the parts, not enough to inconvenience identification. Exactly one of the 71 washers needed was missing, but they provided 4 spares. There were also spares for other high count components that might get lost or damaged. Some parts were preassembled which slowed down the inventory as I read through instructions looking for the part was already there.

Damage
Tiny scuffs and a tiny crinkle on the weight shield, I doubt anyone can find it now that it is together. I only found it because I had to juggle the shield during assembly.

Assembly
The weight shields weren’t obvious on inspection which way was up and down. At first it appeared that the holes didn’t line up but when I realized it was upside down, it fit fine. They used two round holes and two oblong holes to allow for any manufacturing tolerances. I would have put the round holes at the top to make assembly a little easier.

They provided stamped metric wrenches and Allen keys in case you have no tools. I used a metric ratchet combination wrench and a socket wrench as well as T handle Allen keys. The only sizes needed were 10, 17 and 24 mm wrenches and 3, 5 and 6 mm Allen keys.

They suggest two person assembly. I did everything myself. There were one or two places a second person could have helped but I managed fine alone.

Initial experience.
The gym is very versatile. All the attachments needed are included for a variety of exercises – 18 different setups are illustrated on the sheets that can be attached to the device. There are attachable options with places to store most of them when not in use. I’m 5’11” and find it isn’t too small for me. At the other extreme, we have a 5’0” user who might have to stretch a little to reach the handles for the overhead pull down. Being able to adjust the weight from 10 to 154 pounds in 12 pound increments gives a nice overall range of exercise.

Problems
As I was assembling the gym, one of the arms was a very tight fit fitting the shaft into the preassembled bushings. When everything was finished, I saw that this led to difficulty in moving one of the arms when trying to do a chest fly exercise. I figured one of there things was wrong – either the shaft was bent, the shaft was oversize or the bushings were undersized.

After sale support
I contacted the customer support email address in the assembly manual. After waiting a few days for a response, I went online to find Mikolo’s web site. There was a different after sales customer support email address on the site. Using this email, I got a response in a little over a day with a trouble ticket number. After a few exchanges, including photos of the problem and a video, Mikolo FedEx’ed me replacement bushings. This solved the problem! The shaft diameter was 19.99 – 20.01 mm, the original bushings were 19.99 – 20.01 mm, so there was little to no clearance. The new bushings were 20.06 – 20.08 mm, providing at least 0.05 mm clearance and perfect operation.

The bottom line
A great product with outstanding customer support. It is easy to assemble, use and switch between different exercises. I’d buy the same product again with no concerns.

Everything seems to be great with this home gym.However, it was not made for bigger people.The way that it is laid out.You have to be skinny or not.A big person or you won’t be able to even close the handlebars. I feel like this gym was such a great concept.But the way that it was built, it should have been built a little bit differently. It does make it harder to use as a female… If you catch my drift….