Opinion: Elliptical machine upstairs in an old home?

alphabetsalad

My husband and I are considering purchasing an elliptical machine. We live in a 100-year-old home, and unfortunately our basement height doesn't have enough clearance to allow us to use the machine down there (which would have been my preference). I have to admit that I'm a little concerned about the idea of having it on one of the upper floors, as ellipticals are so heavy just sitting there on their own, let alone when in use, and this is such an old home with creaky floors (not to mention built to 100-year-old building code standards!).

Maybe I'm just being too paranoid and it would be fine, but I don't know. What do you think? Would you feel comfortable installing/using an elliptical machine on an upper floor in an old home? Opinions welcome!

opuntia

How heavy is it? I guess I would mentally compare it to bookcases full of books, or a bath full of water, which the floors will likely have had to hold up throughout the years. And things like books have got lighter over the years, and so has furniture. So the floors will have supported some pretty heavy weights in their time.

I've never seen creaky floors as a sign that a floor is weak - wherever I've lived there have always been creaky floors (in the UK, that is). It's quite normal here.

When you bought the house, did you get a survey done? That would have told you if the floors were weak.

alphabetsalad

How heavy is it? I guess I would mentally compare it to bookcases full of books, or a bath full of water, which the floors will likely have had to hold up throughout the years. And things like books have got lighter over the years, and so has furniture. So the floors will have supported some pretty heavy weights in their time.

I've never seen creaky floors as a sign that a floor is weak - wherever I've lived there have always been creaky floors (in the UK, that is). It's quite normal here.

When you bought the house, did you get a survey done? That would have told you if the floors were weak.

I think it's around 200 lbs (perhaps a little less when you exclude packaging). My worry isn't so much the weight of it sitting there, as the impact it'll have when it's in use.

We had a building inspection done when we bought our place, but it was a based on exposed surfaces only, so they didn't get into any structural inspections.

samblanken

I'm a strucutral engineer. I would not worry about it. When buildings are designed (even homes) we include loads. Imagine how much your bed and mattress weigh with you and your husband in it - all balanced on 4 posts. More pounds per square inch then your elliptical machine. Does your floor fall down from the bed with both of you in it? No. And secondly, older homes are almost always built with real dimensional lumber - I mean a 2" x 4" is actually 2" x 4" - NOT what you would get in todays lumber yards. There's some additional safety factor there.

AmyFett

Don't worry about it! My house is almost 200 years old and I have one on the 3rd floor

Brengild

Our house is 150 years old and I have mine upstairs.

alphabetsalad

Thanks for all the input and advice, everyone - much appreciated! I feel a lot better about the idea of putting an elliptical upstairs.

rextcat

i wouldent put it upstairs if its that heavy, but you can buy smaller light weight elipicals and or tread mills

edited to add, i wouldent put it upstairs not because of the load on the house, its because of the person(s) that has to lug it up the stairs could very easly hurt them selves doing it