exmouse

I can't see any of the photos. Is it just me? Thinking about going to this park next year, be good to see what it's like to help make my mind up.

Zacspin uses a conventional chain lift, Ball Coaster uses LSMs.

Nah!! how about a Vekoma Booster Bike with broomsticks instead of bikes. Basically the coaster that Alton had on the drawing board for Gloomy Wood.

I'd heard at one stage she was in talks with Disney and Universal and had decided to go with Universal. This was over a year ago.

Thorpe Park have a contract with a local crane hire company to supply a 200+ foot cherry picker for doing an evac if Stealth ever stalled. Can't remember what the exact response time was but it was something like 90 minutes.

The press release refers to it as the standard sky wheel design whereby it does two complete revolutions. On the second revolution the LSM works as a boost rather than a launch. But I see no reason why it couldn't be part of an Xtended track.

I only rode it the once and wasn't impressed. In fact I wasn't over fussed by any of the coasters in the park. Admittedly it was back when it was a Six Flags park so the rides may have improved. I wonder if something exciting is afoot as I think this is the only park that Star Parks have kept. I seem to recall reading they wanted to keep this park as it's the one they felt they could invest in heavily. So perhaps we'll see some major new rides appearing on it's site.

I found Scream to be rough and unpleasant. It's one of a very select few B&Ms that I found unpleasant due to vibration and roughness. Medussa west I found superb. It's a tough call between Medussa and Superman Krypton Coaster as to which is my favourite Floorless. It's real shame SFMM couldn't even be bothered to burn off the white lines of the parking lot. Fair enough if they can't afford any themeing or land scaping but it would cost very little to at least make it look less like a parking lot.

I found the restraint extremely comfortable. I got to hang from one a few years ago at IAAPA and was pleased that G Force got the same at DMP. I don't find it crushes me in anyway and I could hang from it for ages, albeit suffer from a head rush. The only restraint I prefer is the B&M clam shell on their speed coasters.

I was under the impression it's all about cost savings. There would be less wear and tear to the trains and the track. Using 1 train instead of 2 doesn't mean that that 1 train will do twice as many circuits in a day. Sure there would be an increase but not double. So this would mean that in total the coaster runs less per day. Apart from the savings in terms of wear to the trains and track you also save on electricity as the lift hill isn't under load as much or if launched then again there must be a large saving. OK that one train is getting more wear in a day than normal but if you alternate trains then overall they would each suffer less wear. Plus with longer queues it means people are trapped standing in line and not sitting on a ride. Which again means less wear and tear as overall all the rides are used less. For example if every ride has a 1 hour queue during an 8 hour day you'd only do 8 rides. But if running rides at maximum capacity reduced queues to 30 minutes then you could do 16 rides. As a result you have selfishly caused not only wear to the rides but also harm to the shareholders pockets.

Just scar them mentally for life.

I think the tunnel leading to the lift hill on Air is superb. I love the way it reminds of driving into a multi storey car park (parking garage). It genuinely gives you that feel. No other tunnel creates such a genuine feeling so well. 2nd to that is the tunnel on Voyage with the tripple down. I love how it catches you out and without the tunnel you'd know it was coming.

Do bunny hills not count as going up hill? I know some of these Alpine Coasters have lots of bunny hills so would this satisfy the argument that a coaster has to go up hill?

Owen careful you'll start to give us Brits a bad name. Sometimes you have to accept that not everyone will agree with you. This is not an open and shut case so people will have differing opinions. I personally regard Goliath and EGF as hypers, OK they're not over 200ft but they're close. My idea of a hyper is a tall coaster with high speed drops, helices and airtime hills and no inversions. With regards to 200+foot woodies I've heard the term Hyper Woodie used on numerous occassions. But generally speaking all the enthusiasts I speak to wouldn't count Colossus as a hyper coaster but they certainly would Goliath and EGF.

Sure Disney can cope with losing a few thousand dollars when they're as big as they are but why should they have to. To much of this sort of behaviour could seriously harm the company. It's built itself on offering good, clean harmelss fun to millions around the world. I'm sure there are a lot of families who might think twice knowing that cast members act in this way. There must be a lot of very conservative/straight laced people shocked by this. The more open minded will think it's funny but not everyone will.

DAFE would be a logical group to get in to restore it, they did some restoration work on it before so probably know the ride inside out.

The antics of the staff at the majority of companies don't draw the media attention that something like this does for Disney. Damage the brand of the characters and Disney loses a lot of money. Without Mickey, Minnie etc we wouldn't have the Disney parks around the world.

Sometimes it's good to go on an unusual coaster that isn't overly intense. Air is fun not thrilling. I enjoy it for what it is an adult kiddie coaster.

I remember when I started working for Mickey that I spent the best part of a day signing various contracts about not aking photos back stage, not damaging the Disney brand, not talking about the characters as if they weren't real ( which they are) etc. etc. I'm sure DLRP can work out who is responsible for this. Yuo can see the faces of several Cast members so they could be interviewed. They could also work out from past rotas who was working that day and narrow down the suspect characters. Whilst it's quite amusing think of all those little kids out there who could be devestated to hear about this. Not to mention the damage this could do to the Disney name.

I count Alpine Coasters as coasters because they free wheel, run on rails, have a lift hill and are powered by gravity. If anything Apline Coasters are more of a coaster than Mack/Intamin Bobsleds. I certainly wouldn't count an Alpine Slide as a coaster. I wouldn't question a launched coaster as the lift is merely replaced by the launch and the ride still fits all the other criteria. Powered coasters are often held back from free wheeling by the motors on downhill sections and only really powered up the hills so they still pretty much meet all the criteria. Using Wiktionary the definition of a roller coaster is "An amusement ride consisting of a buggy on a track that rises and falls and twists and turns." So by that Alpine Coasters can certainly be regarded as a coaster. Ultimately my count is my own and it's up to indivduals to decide what counts and what doesn't.

It's a great idea and full credit to you for going for it. But I'd have a few concerns following on from what others have said. Apart from wood possibly having to much firction you would also have an issue with the track flexing. If the track isn't rigid enough the movement will cause the train to loose speed. Like with proper wooden coasters you would need a heck of a lot of support. I've played around with plastic coaster models and the flex in the track has been my undoing. I'm also not sure how you would manipulate the track to form the inversions. Is wood pliable enough to do this? If your trains are going to freely rotate why do they need "ears"? I assume you are taking these from the design of a traditioanl 4D coaster but these uprights hold an integral part of the rotating mechanism. As you're not using this type of mechanism you don't need the uprights. Your mouse/rabbit design makes it look like a kiddie coaster to me. Glad you're taking a year to research and work on this rather than rushing into making the first thing that comes into your head. Good luck.

They already offered to do that with the Ropers but the offer was declined. You don't need to build a 200 foot hyper woodie to get a decent coaster. From experience most of the taller woodies I've ridden have been rough and not fun eg. The Rattler at SF:FT or SOB or Mean Streak or The Voyage. Where as some of the smaller ones have been fantastic eg. Balder, Legend, Phoenix, Megafobia, Rutschebanan. Size doesn't always matter it's what you do with it that counts. Non of my top 10 woodies are particularly big.

They can't build above the tree line and this woodie won't go above the treeline so all is good. The cross valley woodie that was planned a couple of years back looked hideously dull and unimaginative. Hopefully they will get Intamin in for this one and we'll end up with a quiet airtime machine. I believe there are also plans to plant some giant red wood trees so that they can install a Millennium Force clone for 2208.

During a recent visit to the park I had a tour by the technical director and he said that to get another coaster they would have to remove one as they don't have the space. I like all their coasters so don't know what I'd sacrifice.

The new coaster all looks a bit blah to me. Nothing out of the ordinary doing nothing particularly well. I really enjoyed Kentucky Rumbler so I'm not looking for a world first and record breaker. Renegade just looks to have quite a bit of nothing going on at times. Not a lot of twisterness and certainly very little airtime. I shall reserve proper judgement till next year when I ride it.