The Six Flags Magic Mountain (SFMM) Discussion Thread

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^Hopefully...and if not, then they should.

I don't really understand why Colossus would get a Rocky Mountain treatment...it may not have much in terms of forces, but it's butter smooth. Seriously.

Not to sound like a jerk, but you are 18. You never rode Colossus when it was actually a good ride. Yes, it's "ride-able" now compared to what it was in the early 00's but it's not "butter smooth" by any stretch of the imagination.

Anything that can be done to get the ride even close to what it was in the late 70's/80's is a good thing.

It's the highest capacity ride in the park with all 6 trains: anything to get people to actually go ride the ride again is good for the park!

It's the highest capacity ride in the park with all 6 trains: anything to get people to actually go ride the ride again is good for the park!

I just kinda wish they would race the duel tracks again but one faces forward, the other backward. I'm guessing it's their biggest draw/promo for fright fest though.

Yeah the sucky thing about Colossus getting treatment is there would be no more backwards Colossus on Fright Fest but the capacity is a good point. Imagine the Colossus queue actually being full. Then maybe Scream would have a line some day...

makeing my way out there for lex on saturday that depends how i feel by then tweeked my back walking my friends dog

I don't really understand why Colossus would get a Rocky Mountain treatment...it may not have much in terms of forces, but it's butter smooth. Seriously.

 

Not to sound like a jerk, but you are 18. You never rode Colossus when it was actually a good ride. Yes, it's "ride-able" now compared to what it was in the early 00's but it's not "butter smooth" by any stretch of the imagination.

 

Anything that can be done to get the ride even close to what it was in the late 70's/80's is a good thing.

Agreed.

Colossus used to be a lot better than it is. Now some of the corners are so slow that it feels like the cars have square wheels.

They have 3 options:

1) Leave it as it is. Not a bad ride, but a shadow of it's former self. It will only get steadily worse until it is beyond repair.

2) Give it the full refurbishment ( e.g. Texas Giant)

3) Demolish

I vote for refurbishment.

I doubt Colususs will get anything as dramatic as the Texas Giant treatment.

RCDB.com lists the cost of retracking the Giant at around 10 mil for it's 4920 feet of track. Colosuss has 4325 feet of track on each side, so a retracking and complete overhaul like the one done by Rocky Mountain could easily reach 20 mil with six new trains and the extra cost of steel for making the ride meet earthquake code.

at that cost, they might as well just replace it with something like El Toro.

Heres a nice little nugget of info for all you coaster fans and Magic Mountain nuts...

What you have in that link is the opening for a nice little sitcom from back in the 90s that features our very own Six Flags Magic Mountain in it!

Check it out and see if you can spot the familiar and differences.

^Loved that show just for the intro. And Christine Lakin will always hold a special place in my heart What a fox!

I don't really understand why Colossus would get a Rocky Mountain treatment...it may not have much in terms of forces, but it's butter smooth. Seriously.

Butter smooth may be a bit far, but honestly the last couple times I took a ride Colossus surprised me! It was a pleasant old wooden coaster experience. The only rough spot I've felt in a while was before the second turnaround on the double-up. It seemed like the structure that holds on to the track had a little bit of a soft spot, and as the train ran over it would kind of force the track to flex and the train would sharply jerk back and forth (I call it the Psyclone "back-breaker" syndrome).

The drops are still pretty thrilling if you sit in the back seat, and the bottom of the hills don't slam at all. Like you said, surprisingly smooth, and it just slides over the track with no slamming and minimal vibrations to jerk the car. I kind of like the old style turnaround, gives you some time to fear the 2nd drop (which I actually like better than the 1st).

Heres a nice little nugget of info for all you coaster fans and Magic Mountain nuts...

 

 

What you have in that link is the opening for a nice little sitcom from back in the 90s that features our very own Six Flags Magic Mountain in it!

Check it out and see if you can spot the familiar and differences.

What season did they remove the ocean?

Heres a nice little nugget of info for all you coaster fans and Magic Mountain nuts...

 

 

What you have in that link is the opening for a nice little sitcom from back in the 90s that features our very own Six Flags Magic Mountain in it!

Check it out and see if you can spot the familiar and differences.

 

What season did they remove the ocean?

I'd say the same season Premier Parks bought the company

I don't think this has been touched upon, but what can we really do to colossus with iron-horse retracking? It's not like it's a wooden mess layout like Texas Giant. Texas giant was already a pretty wild ride in terms of layout before the retracking. Colossus follows a pretty simple layout, I don't think it would be worth it considering you couldn't do much. I could be wrong though, there's always a way to do things, I just think making it as wild as the NTAG would require much more work than just tearing it down and building an El Toro type monster.

Colossus used to be a lot better than it is. Now some of the corners are so slow that it feels like the cars have square wheels.

They have 3 options:

1) Leave it as it is. Not a bad ride, but a shadow of it's former self. It will only get steadily worse until it is beyond repair.

2) Give it the full refurbishment ( e.g. Texas Giant)

3) Demolish

Except it's 33 years old and still running well... Either they are doing some great upkeep on it, or it's just not aging badly (like we've noted, it's not like the trains are undergoing forces that would cause them to beat up/wear down the track).

I don't know why they would demolish a giant, fun, ICONIC coaster right on the edge of the park. I feel like now we're just getting dramatic.

And Gregg, you are absolutely right. I have no idea what Colossus was like prior to Tuesday, June 26th of this year. However, I can tell you that, from an unbiased opinion, the ride it gives right now is good. Maybe not great or anything like it used to, but certainly, certainly good.

They could use topper track to make the ride smoother?

The only thing the rides actually need would be topper track, that's it. They can lower some of the airtime hills as well, to give a wilder experience, but I don't think there is a need for any of those crazy overbanked turns that Texas Giant has.

LA Times review of Lex Luthor:

Lex Luthor: Drop of Doom

Last year they retracked some colossus making it pretty smooth. Just increasing the lift speed or removing the pause from the top might help.

Most importantly it wouldn't kill to repaint the thing...

^^^^ Lex Luthor^^^ having 4ft of sway and vibrating when Superman is launched sounds orgasmic.

After watching CBS2 news, it has been revealed that Lex Luthor's drop is 385 feet. This was revealed during an interview with Tim Burkhart. There is also a little music at the top where Lex says "Today is your lucky day. Your life will be changed forever." and the ride drops during "forever". Nice touch! Probably won't be working next year though.

After watching CBS2 news, it has been revealed that Lex Luthor's drop is 385 feet. This was revealed during an interview with Tim Burkhart. There is also a little music at the top where Lex says "Today is your lucky day. Your life will be changed forever." and the ride drops during "forever". Nice touch! Probably won't be working next year though.

Now that you ruined the surprise ....

Some of the fun of drop towers is that you don't know when the drop is coming. Having it drop on "forever" takes the anticipation out of it. I wouldn't mind if it stopped working after the first year.

After watching CBS2 news, it has been revealed that Lex Luthor's drop is 385 feet. This was revealed during an interview with Tim Burkhart. There is also a little music at the top where Lex says "Today is your lucky day. Your life will be changed forever." and the ride drops during "forever". Nice touch! Probably won't be working next year though.

Really cool audio! Did we find out what the exact height of the Giant Drop DROP is? Not that Lex Luthor won't be amazing, especially with the audio.

Some of the fun of drop towers is that you don't know when the drop is coming. Having it drop on "forever" takes the anticipation out of it. I wouldn't mind if it stopped working after the first year.

I totally agree. If the audio is mounted on the gondola I give it a year. If it is mounted on the tower at the top of the drop I'd give it longer.

"And that’s when the shaking starts. The gondola seats rumble violently as the coaster climbs the track, causing the tower sways up to four feet. It feels like an earthquake in a skyscraper - only you’re strapped to the outside of the building." - By Brady MacDonald, Los Angeles Times staff writer

Oh hell yeah! This alone makes up for any height numbers. Can't wait to ride!