Just for context, standard is defined on two fronts.
1. Each machine computes effective Watts differently, so pulling your guts out might be 1kW on one machine, and 400W on another. Whichever one everyone has the most experience with wins here.
2. There are a bunch of different designs across about three different resistance modes available A. air B. water and C. hydraulic piston. Air is generally regarded as the best as it doesn't change felt resistance with time, though it can be somewhat noisy, maybe 70dB. Water heats up as all the energy is dumped into it without anywhere else for it to go, so the viscosity changes very noticeably over a long workout. These also tend to have a nylon strap instead of a chain which stretches and can cause an odd sensation. Finally the worst, hydraulic piston, which has the smallest mass to dump energy into, will change resistance dramatically in a short time, and have been known to fail with experienced rowers, sometimes explosively.
There is room for an electrical resistance variant in this lineup, as has been shown with cycling, though it's important to note that thermodynamics specifies the energy has to go somewhere, and you may end up with a dangerously hot resistor bank somewhere on the machine.
It should also be noted that experienced rowers can output a considerable amount of power. Enough to cause piston rowers to overheat and explode/vent. Just because your resident mechanical engineer can't break the prototype doesn't mean you shouldn't find someone who can hit National Team numbers and have them go at it for an hour straight.
> It should also be noted that experienced rowers can output a considerable amount of power. Enough to cause piston rowers to overheat and explode/vent. Just because your resident mechanical engineer can't break the prototype doesn't mean you shouldn't find someone who can hit National Team numbers and have them go at it for an hour straight.
Another reason why Concept2 is the standard is they sell reasonably priced spare parts for all of their machines going back to the first one they released in 1981 [1]
I don't think I've ever seen a model A in the wild but I've seen plenty of B's still working. I have a 20yo model C that I upgraded with a new monitor and handle and it still works like it was unboxed yesterday.
Couldn't the electric variant convert the energy into electricty? With the guys in the club we many times wondered why we can't use the 8x 250W that are pulled saturday morning to power a microwave oven and everybody gets heated lunch right after the workout? Or use it to drive an AC on a hot summer day.
Depends on where you measure from but yea, 70 might be low. You can talk over two dozen heavies pulling 2ks on air rowers which definitely places it under 100dB.
1. Each machine computes effective Watts differently, so pulling your guts out might be 1kW on one machine, and 400W on another. Whichever one everyone has the most experience with wins here.
2. There are a bunch of different designs across about three different resistance modes available A. air B. water and C. hydraulic piston. Air is generally regarded as the best as it doesn't change felt resistance with time, though it can be somewhat noisy, maybe 70dB. Water heats up as all the energy is dumped into it without anywhere else for it to go, so the viscosity changes very noticeably over a long workout. These also tend to have a nylon strap instead of a chain which stretches and can cause an odd sensation. Finally the worst, hydraulic piston, which has the smallest mass to dump energy into, will change resistance dramatically in a short time, and have been known to fail with experienced rowers, sometimes explosively.
There is room for an electrical resistance variant in this lineup, as has been shown with cycling, though it's important to note that thermodynamics specifies the energy has to go somewhere, and you may end up with a dangerously hot resistor bank somewhere on the machine.
It should also be noted that experienced rowers can output a considerable amount of power. Enough to cause piston rowers to overheat and explode/vent. Just because your resident mechanical engineer can't break the prototype doesn't mean you shouldn't find someone who can hit National Team numbers and have them go at it for an hour straight.