Precor 9.33 Treadmill Stopping after a few minutes. Error Code 27

What's wrong with my Precor 9.33 Residential Treadmill, and how do we fix it?

A gentleman with a Precor 9.33 Treadmill at home recently contacted us with this question. His intitial contact said, paraphrasing, "I have a Precor Treadmill at home. It was working great. Now it stops after just a few minutes of operation. Error 27 is displayed when it stops. What is wrong with the treadmill and what will it take to fix it?"

This is such a great (and often mysterious) topic, that we wanted to publish it for all to read. Hopefully we can de-mystify the situation and take away a little frustration. Precor has some fantastic design engineers and they build fantastic treadmills and other fitness equipment. Sometimes service and repair information, for the average treadmill owner, can be a little, shall we say, challenging to find. Luckily, we are what you call professionals, and we have the answers.

Bottom line up front: Error code 27 means the drive motor has pulled maximum current - usually due to worn walking belt and deck. There are other situations where the drive motor will pull maximum current, such as when there is a drop in supply voltage. When the available voltage drops, the amp draw increases. The treadmill drive motor might also pull excessive current if it the maximum user weight is exceeded, or if a foreign object gets jammed somewhere and seizes the walking belt or rollers, or of the roller bearings are failing. In most cases, it means the walking belt and deck are well worn and need to be replaced. The very smart Precor engineers built in this safe guard to protect more sensitive electronics on the treadmill, such as the Power Control Module also called the lower control board or motor control board.

What does it take to fix it?
The walking belt and deck need to be replaced. While you are at it, the drive belt should be replaced. The deive belt probably needs to be replaced, but even if not needed immediately, you should do it. The reason is that the walking belt, deck, and drive belt are all wear items and all need to be replaced from time to time. If you replace the drive belt at the same time as your are replacing the walking belt and deck, then you will save a bunch of money on labor. If you only replace the treadmill walking belt and deck, and then 3 months later, decide to replace the drive belt, you'll be charged regular labor rates for the work. The cost of the drive belt part is pretty cheap, relatively.

How about the cost? At the time of this writing, the Precor 9.33 Treadmill walking belt is $297. The Deck is 295. The drive belt is $44. These figures do not include tax, shipping, or any handling charges.

A lot of folks balk at such a high repair bill. Our advice is that repair is generally always less expensive that replacement, so if the treadmill is otherwise in oretty good shape and is giving you the kind of workout that you want, then it makes financial sense to repair it. If, on the other hand, you are thinking about some other features or a bigger or faster, new treadmill, then this is a good time to buy one.

The deck on the Precor 9.33 treadmill is reversible. That means it is doublesided and can be flipped over, so that the othersise can be run on for a, hopefully, a couple years. If it has not yet been flipped, then we can repair it by just replacing the walking belt and the drive belt and flipping the deck.

Please check your service records and see if that deck has been flipped or not. That info will give us a pretty good idea of what we need to do to get it fixed.