- Rack rust.
Oh.
- Hi. I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist.
- Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- And together we are the most famous physical therapists
on the internet.
- Well, in our opinion, of course, Bob.
- Brad, today we're gonna review,
I might get the name right here
the Sunny Health and Fitness Twister Stepper.
It's not just a stepper.
It's a twister stepper.
- That's quite a mouthful.
And if you're watching this in June,
this is because we're doing this
about a week before Christmas.
So if you're gonna buy this for a Christmas present,
this review, it's gonna be very helpful
if you want it for a product.
- This was on Amazon for about $55.
Very easy to assemble, weighs about 21 pounds
which is, I mean, you can move it.
But if you're elderly it may be a little difficult
to move. I mean, I don't think you'd want to move it
on a regular basis.
The assembly, all it was is that you had to put this wheel
on and slide the cable on there
and put the gauge on there and put this knob.
I mean, it was five minutes. Very simple.
Now the idea behind this is that
should we just start showing it, Brad?
Or do you want show how that cable goes around here?
- Well, no, let's show how it works
and work from the big picture down.
- All right. Let's bring it down here on the floor.
Now, some people were concerned, especially,
if you're a little bit elderly or there was a lady
with Multiple Sclerosis that didn't have the best balance.
So she did start by holding onto a chair.
Actually, Brad I probably should put the chair
away right now.
- Now, Bob, talk about people have used this
and they gave reviews.
- Yeah. There was, let me just get the numbers right,
309 reviews on Amazon.
And they gave it an average review
of 4.3 out of 5, which is actually pretty good.
- Right.
- But the negative reviews were kind of revealing.
And we'll talk about that, but right here
so you get on and what you're seeing,
well, you probably can't see from this angle
but you actually get a little bit of twist going on too.
- Yeah. So as he's going, you get some hip motion,
and I use an elliptical on a regular basis and I use this
and there's definitely using some lateral muscles.
That's a benefit to this machine.
- But some people had to hold onto a chair.
I'm so tall. I don't think I could even hold onto a chair
while I'm doing this.
- Right. You got his head in there? Or from the hips down.
- Another lady complained that
she felt like it didn't give enough range.
That you're just stepping real lightly.
You will get your heart rate up with this though, Brad.
I mean, I start getting a little bit
out of breath and I work out every day.
- Yeah. I don't think you're gonna get to aerobic really
but you might ...
- It's not high end.
- Right. But it depends on the level of ...
- Do you want to give me the arms?
- Yeah. Let's look at these.
- These, by the way I think are worthless.
Most people just said they didn't use them.
Because what are you supposed to do with this?
- Yeah. They just throw you off balance.
- It throws you off balance.
Maybe they actually help your balance to start off with.
- Yeah. It's kind of a marketing gimmick
for a picture in the front of the cover.
- Criticism I've seen on almost all these machines
like this is the gauge never works for long.
It tells you how long you've got
how many steps or you can count calories and all that.
But every one I've ever seen
of these almost always breaks after a while.
- And which is fine. It still functions.
But that information is not that important.
- Now this was built. you're not supposed
to have anybody over 250 pounds,
but these are the big criticisms that I have.
And this is in the manual itself.
It talks about that. you're only supposed to use it
for 10 to 15 minutes and actually 15 minutes, I guess
is what the guideline is and what happens after 15 minutes,
apparently, I don't know if you can see these pistons,
Nancy, let's go this way.
These are actually, it's already starting to get warm.
- Right.
- And I think what supposedly the lady was saying
after 15 minutes they start to squeak
and they really start to get overused.
You're not even supposed to touch these
after you've been doing it because they get so wide.
- They even have a warning sticker right here.
They're made for short term.
That's why you're not going to get any aerobic benefits
because you need to get ...
- You're supposed to do 15, 20 minutes at least.
- And then by the time you get aerobic
the machine's heated up and squeaking.
- So the other concern is that, and they said
this little cable here can start squeaking, too.
We're supposed to put some WD-40
or I guess the bicycle lubricant
somebody has also mentioned,
but all the stress is on this bolt right here.
I don't know if you can see that, Nancy ...
- And that bolt has broken on some people.
- And that bolt has broken on people.
Now these were the negative reviews I was reading,
but what they were saying
it didn't take that long to break it either.
I mean, some of them were like six months
and one person, he replaced the bolt
and the cable broke, which I'm pretty surprised.
That's a heavy duty cable.
- Yeah.
- But I suppose it broke on this part, right?
Where it's crimped.
- I think this is a really good idea for an exercise machine
but it's 50 some dollars.
It's just not built very well.
And if you're going to give it to somebody that
you know they're going to use it for a month
and then they're going to put it in the closet
because that's what they always do with their equipment,
good gift.
- Yeah.
- But if you're going to give it
to someone that's pretty serious,
you know they're going to use it on a regular basis.
They want to get aerobic
and use more than 15, 20 minutes on it, scrap it.
- Yeah. There was one lady who she only weighed less
than 150 pounds.
She had already bought three machines
which means she really liked it.
- Yeah.
- But it broke three times each one of the times
it broke on her.
So she just went and got a new one.
One thing that worried me is one lady said it broke
on her and there was no warning.
So all of a sudden the foot just gave way.
- Sure.
- And all of a sudden, I mean, you could get really hurt.
- Yeah.
- One guy complained that this elastic band had broken
on him and actually cut his leg.
But I would think that would be fairly difficult to do.
- I mean, if you had a good lawyer
maybe you'd have to do that.
- So I mean, it's a cool idea.
if it would last longer
I would definitely give it a high recommendation.
But I mean, if you're a serious person about doing this,
I don't think I can in good faith recommend it.
- I agree. So I don't know.
If you want to get something good, you can always get
some hand weights. They're never gonna break down.
- You want to do your little flip thing?
- You better believe it.
- One other comment, one lady had bought it
because she wanted to put it under her desk is a big issue.
- Now that would last.
- Yeah, but it doesn't though,
because she says she couldn't push it down.
It was too hard to push down.
You need your weight to push it down.
- Yeah. And it doesn't come. Yeah. I see.
- And by the way, it just came apart.
- Well, the cables came up. Yeah. I don't know.
All right. There you go. What's it called again?
- The Sunny Twister. Hold on.
Sunny Health and Fitness Twister Stepper.
That's a mouthful.
- You better believe it. Take care.
- Have fun.
Okay. Brad, it's all yours.
I don't want anything else to do with it.
- Bob, I just found my lucky (indistinct).
You have to pick it up. Come on, there you go.
Looks good.