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Old rowing machines, while similar to modern units, are drastically different in both their make and overall operation. While they facilitate the same exercises, technology has just advanced so far at this point that the differences in their design is highly remarkable. Making a rowing machine comparison between the original units against the newer ones doesn’t really do much for either’s value as the divide between them is just plain too wide.

Rowing Machine Comparison: Resistance

When doing a rowing machine comparison between old and modern units, it’s easy to see why the old equipment never picked up in popularity. They simply didn’t hold up to sustained use, apart from being extremely heavy and bulky.

The early designs of rowing machines used metal spring coils to provide resistance during the sculling movement. Every time you pull on the rowing handles, the spring coil resists the stretching, creating the muscle tension you’re looking to feel. Problem is, spring usually deteriorates as it sees more use. As such, the resistance actually decreased the more you used the machine – not exactly what you want to happen when you’re looking for a way to stimulate muscles to grow.

Spring coils also presented another issue – their tension is fixed. As such you’re stuck with whatever resistance they offered. If they felt too tight, you had no choice but to move on and just do another exercise. If they felt too loose, there were no options to increase the counter-force either. As you probably know, you need variable resistance to shock your muscles into growth. Otherwise, they grow accustomed to the weight and show no further gains.

It can be said when making a rowing machine comparison that the old units served strictly cardio training purposes, allowing you to perform the rowing motions repeatedly (and in fast bursts) for exercise. As far as contributing to muscle growth, they were simply ill-equipped.

Rowing Machine Comparison: Size

Two variants of rowing machines that evolved out of the spring coil originals are the pulley and wheel designs. The pulley weight models use a weighted load at the end of the rope to provide the necessary resistance to the exercise. Since you can add more weight to increase the load or lessen it to reduce resistance, it provided the flexibility that the spring-based original units didn’t have.

The wheel designs, on the other hand, used a metal cable that wrapped around a wheel. When pulled, the wheel rotates to let more of the cable loose and automatically spun the other way when let go. Resistance, in this case, is directly applied on the wheel using the many varied methods now available.

Since both of them are now capable of providing variable load, a rowing machine comparison between the two models usually focused on the relative sizes of the units. Pulley weight models are usually bulky, because of the weights system installed. They also required extra work during use, manually increasing and decreasing the resistance by adjusting the weight.

Because of the efficiency of its design, wheel models are usually smaller and more compact. In a rowing machine comparison of models currently in the market, the wheeled designs naturally dominate. While weighted pulley systems may find application in commercial gyms, wheeled models are simply a better fit for home and private use.