Why Does My Treadmill Start at Full Speed Then Stop?

[rahulkhajuria]

I am a person in India . I bought a Treadmill from an Indian Company called “Pro Bodyline Fitness” about 5-6 years ago . In India , the Voltage fluctuates from 215 to 245 Volts & my Treadmill’s Manual says it takes in 200 Volts +/- 10 % . I Hardly used my Treadmill regularly till a few months back . About a month back , the belt moved over more to one side & I kept using the Treadmill in this condition . As a result the Belt wore & I got it replaced from a technician . He did not use any lubricant while replacing the belt . However ,after getting the belt replaced ,my treadmill has started acting strangely . When I press the start button on the Console , sometimes it starts at the proper speed but at other times , it starts at full speed & then stops after a few seconds. When it starts at Full Speed the Error Condition shown on the Console is “ER03” . I have been supplied with a Xeroxed short version of the User Manual . (Only a few pages thick) . I looked up this in the Manual & it says this Error means “Speed Error Too Much” . Further, as for the treatment of the Error , it says “Self-Testing or connecting Professional Service Station” . A few days back when I started it , it started just right but after 10-15 minutes , it suddenly stopped . And a few seconds after that , it restarted at the same speed that I had set it to .

I called up the same technician but he couldn’t really diagnize the problem & said to simply pull off the safety plug & then plug it back in when this happens . However , doing this doesn’t really solve the problem .

Any guesses as to what the problem could be & how to go about diagnosing it ? Could one part that has become damaged , damage other parts in a Treadmill (Like the human body wherein sometimes one organ failure causes multiple organ failure) ? Which part or parts , if in a damaged state , can damage other parts in a treadmill ?

 

[Wrichik Basu]

Hard to say without looking into the treadmill, but Bodyline machines are not worth spending on. I had a motorised treadmill couple of years back. After the free 1-year service, the motor got burnt, and had to be replaced twice before we finally threw it away. In your case, there might be a problem with the MCB.

 

[Grinkle]

The belt moving to the side is caused by the front and back roller bars not being parallel to each other and to the bend of the belt - my treadmill (different mfr than yours) has an adjustment screw on the back roller bar.

I am going to guess speed error is not something you can service - its likely there is a component on the control board that is bad and either the setpoint is stuck to max on the user control panel or the input to the stepper controller is stuck to max (that may be a distinction without a difference). The only thing I that occurs to me you might try, based on my tongue-in-cheek rule number one of electronic system debug being "plug it in" (rule number two is "turn it on") is to dis-assemble the treadmill control panel from the body and make sure all of the connectors are well seated, then re-assemble.

If the control board is mostly discrete components and you have a schematic you might be able to dig deeper into it; my experience obtaining schematics for treadmill control boards is zero, for what that is worth.

 

[Baluncore]

Maybe the replacement belt is not sufficiently parallel or is slack and needs to be adjusted.

Check to see if a speed sensor, or mounting, near one of the rollers was damaged when the belt was changed. That would explain the intermittent speed problems.

 

[rbelli1]

Has anyone noticed this problem arose over 7 years ago? The offending contraption is almost certainly rusting in a landfill somewhere.

BoB

 

[davenn]

Has anyone noticed this problem arose over 7 years ago?

yeah, it was one of those unanswered thread tidyups

 

[Wrichik Basu]

Has anyone noticed this problem arose over 7 years ago?

True, but the problem is evident even to this day. At least with the brand the OP has mentioned.