coasterbill

Most lift hills are a tad bit crooked, you never notice unless you are looking straight up or straight down the hill. I noticed that for the first time when riding steel force. And on some woodies you can even feel the cars bending as they go up the lift. It doesn't help that Steel Force feels like it's trying to tip the train over the left side all the way up. It feels like the right rail is higher than the left... I'm sure it's not but for whatever reason that is one screwed up lift hill.

Sadly with Goliath's new train, Flashback is the better of the 2 rides by far. I'm not saying that should dictate if it should stay or not as right now Goliath is much more popular but I rarely see Flashback without a line so plenty of people seem to like it.

I'm glad to see so much optimism and I wish I felt the same way but I actually feel like recently, Six Flags has been more frustrating than the Shapiro years or even the late 90's and early 2000's where there was a ton of closed rides everywhere. Lately the parks have been cost cutting at a ridiculous rate and while it's great that every park adds something new every year that doesn't make up for so many parks starting to close major rides hours before the park closes for the night which is completely ridiculous or doing things like leaving huge pieces of old rides rotting away in highly visible areas because they don't feel like removing them. I hate to be negative and I rarely am on this forum except when I'm talking about Six Flags but we find ourselves visiting their parks less and less every year because despite their awesome rides the way they run their parks is horrendous. Six Flags New England can't even have the effects working in Houdini's pre-show. I'd love to see this chain maintain these awesome animatronics but I just don't have any faith in them doing that.

This post didn't get nearly the attention it deserved.

As corny as the Clyde and Seamore show is, it's one of my favorite shows at Sea World and I'm thrilled that they're re-imagining it. We'll be sure to check it out next time we're down there.

I always get the free water... I never have much of a desire to drink soda at parks anyway.

The hills almost look triangular. I mean... look at the upper right corner of that picture. What IS that?

Great pictures. Thanks for sharing...

It's the best one i've ever experienced. The only ones that are even close are some other Schwarzkopf loops. Of the "modern" loops I think Kumba and (this is out of left field) Kings Dominion's Dominator are both great in the back seat but they're not on the same level as a Schwarzkopf. Not even close...

Rice to Riches is pretty good, we went there once after leaving Lombardi's (which I think is the best pizza in the city). It sounds like you guys had a great time. I'm really enjoying these updates.

How does this have anything to do with reliability? You're probably not going to find a full circuit coaster anywhere that can handle anything in the 40° area... I know I've said this a lot lately but Great Adventure runs their coasters in seemingly any temperature including temperatures way below 40 degrees. There must be a cut-off somewhere but I've never seen them hit it so some coasters can run in colder temperatures. You're still right though, coasters being able to run in cold temperatures has nothing to do with the manufacturer's track record for reliability.

Enthusiasts have very little to do with it... the ride puts up huge ridership numbers and the general public loves it too. There's no reason to ever iron horse the most iconic ride in the park that's immensely popular with basically everyone who visits the park except a few whiny enthusiasts. I'm so glad this ride is at Knoebels, because that pretty much guarantees that nothing major will ever be changed and the ride will always be incredibly well maintained. No matter where this ride was it would never be an Iron Horse candidate but a lot of parks would probably let it decline over the years and Knoebels will never do that.

The Beast isn't even in my top 20 or maybe even 30 overall but riding the Beast in the front seat at night this year was the absolute best ride I've ever had on any coaster ever and the only thing that comes close to being that amazing is the ride we had in the front seat of the Beast the next night. During the day the coaster is unique, but underwhelming... but just because of the night rides it gives this coaster is flat out legendary.

Blue Streak was running really badly this year in the wheel seats, but it's great in a non-wheel seat. Try it again in the middle row of any car. If you sat in one of those rows and still found it rough then I agree with FaithPlus1, lay off the bath salts. ... and even in a wheel seat Blue Streak is nowhere near the worst coaster in the world. It's not even the worst coaster in the park.

The only coasters that I consider good candidates for Iron Horse treatment are newer wood coasters that are relatively tall and fast and give crappy rides. No classic wood coasters should get this treatment and no modern wood coasters that don't suck should either. I agree of course that they shouldn't Iron Horse it but why do people talk about this coaster like it's the greatest thing ever? I liked it but it had no airtime and wasn't overly memorable.

I approve of any park with a rim-driven Paratrooper so I'm almost embarrassed to say I'd never heard of this place before seeing this report. It's always great seeing updates from smaller parks like this.

So will Justice League: Battle for Metropolis because it won't open until August.

I've only ridden Mystery Mine and untamed but I didn't find either ride rough at all. I enjoyed both but I absolutely LOVE Mystery Mine. It's my favorite coaster at Dollywood (though all of their coasters are great) and I rank this coaster way higher than most people do... around #10 overall out of about 240 coasters. It's incredibly unique, it has one of the best finales of any coaster anywhere... it has a surprise drop that comes out of nowhere in the outdoor section and the theming is awesome for a non Disney / Universal park in the U.S. Every enthusiast has a few coasters that they rank way higher than everyone else and for me Mystery Mine is one of them. I love everything about that ride.

When we were there earlier this year they just reversed one right back into the station and loaded it immediately. Ryan is right, they test every train in the morning on Dragster and then pull one off.

I just suffered through that video and there's one major problem with this entire plan, nothing will make people deny the existence of god faster than a ride on a Hopkins looper. Also were they really just comparing cross sizes?

That depends on the ride. Some can run in colder temperatures than others by design or by using different wheel setups. I know this isn't a Great Adventure discussion but I have to ask... does Great Adventure even have a point where they'll close the coasters (besides Kingda Ka)? They seem to completely disregard weather with the lone exceptions being snow on the tracks or lightning in the area. They ran Nitro last week in the sleet. They're awesome. I think it's kind off odd that the same chain that runs coasters in basically anything at Great Adventure seems to be a little more strict at their other parks but being a ride op you probably have more insight into that than I do. Would wheel setups generally be the main reason for this?

Very cool... I could watch that all day.

I guess it depends on what you consider a Terrain coaster. People are being pretty liberal with their definitions. My first thought was Boulder Dash. The Beast came to mind too, the Beast is better than Boulder Dash at night and Boulder Dash is better than the Beast during the day. The Beast isn't much of a terrain coaster except for in a few spots though. I saw a few people mention Tatsu but I don't see how that's a terrain coaster. If it is then that gets my vote. Honorable mention goes to Tennessee Tornado because it's amazing.

Apparently a fire broke out last night in the Safari area. Luckily no people or animals were harmed. Link

No log flume that I know of has a seatbelt. Please stop giving Cedar Fair ideas because they LOVE unnecessary seatbelts.