With more than 200 pieces of equipment at the Campus Recreation Center, John Sweeney has his hands full.

Sweeney, the director of the Rec, said although the equipment is used extensively, machines at the Rec are for the most part working and in order. Currently, less than 5 to 10 percent of machines are out of order.

“Like any equipment, the cardio and weight training pieces get used and abused,” Sweeney said. “It is not unusual to have some pieces out of order at any given time during the year.”

Rebecca Lewis, coordinator for the Rec, said new equipment such as cardio, free weight and selectorized weight equipment starts at about $1,000 and goes up depending on the piece of equipment.

Lewis said the cost is for commercial use, not home equipment, which makes a difference in price.

“Equipment gets replaced after we determine it is becoming more expensive to repair it than to purchase a new one,” Lewis said. “A good example would be the old treadmills that we just moved out. They were purchased in 1995 and we’ve used them heavily ever since. We’ve replaced numerous parts over the years to keep them running, but after 10 years they have exceeded their normal expected life so we took them out of service and replaced them with brand new ones.”

Due to the high volume of use by the NIU community, the Rec does have an in-house maintenance program and has a $5,000 contract with an off-campus company that services the equipment on a regular basis.

The company assesses the machines and puts the parts in order based on what needs to be fixed.

New equipment from the Rec comes from a revenue budget, Lewis said. The amount of money the Rec receives a year is based on overall student enrollment.

Lewis said depending upon what needs to be repaired, new belts and decks for treadmills cost around $250 each.

“It is impossible to carry all of the necessary parts included in these 200 plus machines,” Sweeney said. “The age of the equipment is also a major factor in equipment performance and repairs. We do a very good job of maintaining the equipment and work as quickly as possible to have equipment repaired ASAP.”

Senior psychology major Amy Rohmuses goes to the Rec regularly, but has not noticed a decrease in the number of machines available.

“I haven’t really noticed a lot of broken machines lately,” Rohm said.

Junior psychology major Lynniece Carter has been the secretary at the Rec for about nine months. She said students rarely come up to the front office to complain about broken equipment.

“If a student is going to the machine and notices the machine is not working, they come up to the front desk,” Carter said. “We put an ‘out of order’ on the machine and that is the end of it.”

A majority of machines that are broken are limited as to when they can be fixed by the delivery of parts, which come from various places around the country, Sweeney said.

“We do post an ‘out of order’ sign with an explanation on each of the pieces of equipment that are down,” Sweeney said. “Some of the equipment we have at the Rec is brand new, others are ten years old.”

Sweeney said it is important for students to let the Rec know when machines are broken.

“I work out there, too,” Sweeney said. “It is good to communicate with students and have them be vocal about what machines are broken, [especially] if one breaks while they are on the machine. We are on top of things. We try and take care of things as they are being reported.”