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CoryPa77

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Everything posted by CoryPa77

  1. My wife and I were in line at about 6:30-6:45 and it went down due to weather. They did make an announcement saying they didn’t know how long it would be, but most around me took it as they would let us ride unless it would be something ridiculous like 9pm. Anyway, knowing FL and how most storms don’t last long, we waited. Finally, around 7:50 the ride opened again and they let everyone in line get one final ride. Definitely a bittersweet moment, but glad Universal didn’t just run us out of the queue.
  2. Who would have guessed 10-15 years ago that Dueling Dragons would be torn down, but the 8th Voyage of Sinbad and Poseidon's Fury would still be there? It's too bad they couldn't have utilized those areas for more Potter expansion.
  3. Maybe this will give SeaWorld a great opportunity in the coming years to distinguish itself as the real thrill/roller coaster park in Orlando and be able to cater to the families with teenagers. I had heard that Universal had considered doing other things with the Hulk land when they initaly were planning its refurb, but so many guests stated it was their most memorable ride of their visit, so that's what drove them to rebuild it exactly as it was. I don't think the Dragons were necessarily at the end of their lifespan just yet, but Universal realized it could happen in the next 7-10 years and I think they figured they'd just go ahead and act now on the Potter stuff while it's still hot.
  4. Actually, when it first opened it had concrete footers where the on-ride photo area is now for a transfer track. They're probably still there under the dirt and stuff, not that it matters cause I doubt they have any intentions of adding a second train at this point. But, it was designed with adding a second train being the plan after a few years.
  5. What I've been told is that it sounds pretty much like popcorn popping times a billion. As a side note: I was incredibly confused until I realized that this was a trip report from April. I thought they had just launched another F9 after Thursday's "anomaly." I've never heard the popcorn comparison, but it's actually pretty good for rockets with solid propellant. Falcon 9 rockets are liquid fueled launches, so they're much quieter than their solid counterparts. The Space Shuttle had *massive* Solid Rocket Boosters on it, so it gave off a very loud and crackling sound. Some Delta IV and Atlas V rockets today can have some solid boosters on them in certain configurations.
  6. The last few years of B&M rides have been far better than their last 10 year average I think. Thunderbird, Banshee, and Fury all seem way more aggressive and faster paced than a lot of the newer B&Ms. Thunderbird really shocked me with its pacing. I think Sea World even went with the shorter trains because they wanted this ride to zip along the course and so far it looks like it's delivering!
  7. I think the launch technology is probably going to change, and apparently (according to someone in this thread who has been right about everything else) it will still have overheads (some people wondered whether it might have vest restraints). Universal said that the queue would be getting "enhancements" so I guess this might be modernised. I actually quite liked the vibe of the old queue with the cartoon video, but I'm interested to see what they do. As rcdider says, the track is idential. I thought they might smooth it out and remove some of the snaps, but apparently they've not even done this, they just clicked 'print' They kinda just hit 'print', but they did change some stuff up. For example, the new track is built using the latest tolerances. This is evidenced in they no longer are using the old ball and socket connections for many joints, but just a flat connection now (see the supports leading into the first corkscrew as an example). They started using that style of track connection around 2005-2006 I think. Also, the track segments in several spots are slightly different lengths than the previous version. One spot I've really noticed this is the top piece of track in the first corkscrew now appears to be either longer or slightly placed different with respect to the support as you exit that element. You can count the track ties on the old vs the new and see how they've changed. Which, I'd also add that I expect a smoother experience since their track tolerances are much tighter than the old ride. Also, they might be using thicker gauge steel in the higher G areas now, which means the track should hold up better this time around.
  8. Awesome, thanks for setting me straight! I agree that Ed Hart and KK will have two, top tier, rides.
  9. I'm not sure Alan even designed this one, I think it may be all Joe's doing. Of course, they could split the designs up, I'm not exactly sure. I do know Joe designed Lightning Run also, so that's a good sign!
  10. I think the best thing that came from SOB was that (supposedly) Stengel supposedly wanted to use plug-n-play track for it, but the new track wouldn't have been ready by 2000 - which was important for KI. So, at least KI asking for a 200' wood coaster sorta created this "need" for a new track system which didn't previously exist and probably helped fund the design efforts. Too bad no parks are making more use of that system today though.
  11. While it's gonna be a clone of the original, I do think that we'll likely see a slightly smoother ride, just because a) it's new again! And b) I think their (Clermont Steel) manufacturing in 2016 is WAY more precise than it was in 1998 (which was still coaster industry leading back then).
  12. Invertalon knows his stuff! Go back and look at his posts from last summer and you'll see he accurately said what was going to happen to Hulk before any of the deconstruction or announcement happened. Besides all that... They're not changing the supports around or moving the footers - so that alone tells you it's gonna be the same transitions and everything. I'm pretty sure Universal didn't want to mess with any of the engineering of the track. Once you start "tweaking" anything then you have a waterfall, changing, effect of other elements from that point on and then it gets really difficult to keep everything in that same real estate area and re-use of the footers. This is going to be an insanely expensive refurb though, especially considering 90% of a coaster's cost is in the fabrication and construction (assuming a non-prototype) and this one even involved deconstruction. I'm thinking it has to be $20+ million.
  13. Yeah, there aren't very many wooden coasters that are about the laterals anymore. I guess they're just going out of style? A lot of the late 90's CCIs avoided the use of ledgers as much as possible I've noticed. So, keeping the turns flat meant you could get away with only one ledger. I think the Legend actually had no y-ledgers prior to this modification, which is pretty amazing really. The ledger is the most expensive single piece of wood on a coaster, so by reducing them as much as possible, it cuts down on material costs. The problem with a lot of the flat turns are the PTCs would ride wheelies on them a lot, which means the upstop wheels were acting as the primary running wheels for those cars!
  14. Actually not. Disney has completely rebuilt at least one Space Mountain and one Thunder Mountain. Hulk is nearly to that same cult status. They want to keep it, it's an iconic ride, but after the equivalent of 25+ years worth of use it needs to be completely replaced. Just wondering, but did Disneyland completely rebuild Space Mountain (both structure and track) or did they just replace the track? I definitely could be wrong, but I was thinking they just replaced all the track and left the structure intact. Either way, seeing Hulk re-done this way is definitely something I wouldn't expect to see many other parks do with their aging B&Ms because I'm sure this is costing a pretty penny. Probably 90% of coaster costs are tied up in construction and fabrication. This is surely a $20+ million project. Like what was said up above, Hulk is essentially the equivalent of a 25-30 year old coaster with the way it's been operated and on top of that, most parks are able to do some maintenance in the winter time anyway.
  15. They have the vast majority of financing already in place, so not sure where people are getting the idea that they have a long ways to go in terms of financing this project. I could have very well been told wrong, but I was told several big investors backed out in the last however many months. I hope they do get it going though. It seems like I've seen the price of what it will cost to build double from around $250 million earlier this year to about $500 million now.
  16. Agreed. I am less skeptical than I was before, but I still don't want to get my hopes up too much. I am crossing my fingers on this one! The family wanting to build it are successful developers from Miami. I have a feeling they'll get the funding. They're successful with a bar/restaurant in Miami called Mangos, but this is a whole other animal than that. Mangos is $50 million and this will be 10x that, it's going to be a tall order to gather up a half billion dollars. I'm optimistic about this, but they still have a long ways to go from what I understand, so I think we could be looking at a few years from ground breaking even. I could be wrong, but that's the "word on the street" so to speak. At least they made it past this major hurdle though.
  17. I didn't see this posted elsewhere, but it pretty much confirms all new track and supports for Hulk. The quote of interest is: "By the time we are done, we will have recycled more than 800 tons of steel," Tom Schroder said. "You are seeing the first step in that process." I think one piece of track is about 4 tons, so 100 pieces of track would be 400 tons. This is double that even. http://www.orlandosentinel.com/travel/attractions/theme-park-rangers-blog/os-universal-hulk-coaster-scrapyard-20151001-post.html -Cory
  18. Well, they out source all their ride dynamics to Ride Centerline, so not quite.
  19. Thing is, if it's a B&M, I would imagine it's going to be very large if they're already this far into construction. B&Ms usually go up at a very fast rate and HW doesn't even open until May.
  20. I'm pretty sure SF has a exclusive rights to the Iron Horse track from RMC for a good while. In fact, they might even share some ownership from when it was developed for Texas Giant. I know SF funded a LOT of the research behind that technology. So, sadly, I don't think we're going to see any Iron Horse treatment on non-SF coasters for at least a few more years. I would think that RMC/Ride Centerline could work some serious magic with a ride like Mean Streak. On the other hand, parks can still go with the topper track though - like the new ride in Sweden and Outlaw Run.
  21. I've never heard it confirmed (and doubt anyone would), but I've been told that Six Flags has a contract with Rocky Mountain for exclusive use of the Iron Horse track for a few more years (2-3). So, we won't be seeing any non-SF parks transforming their wood coasters for a while if that's true. This being due to the amount of money/work SF put into developing that technology for Texas Giant.
  22. I don't think Alan Schilke would leave RMC in cooperation with B&M. He seems unlikely to design for other manufacturers although he designed Lightning Run's train for Chance Alan Schlike owns his own company, Ride Centerline, and they do all the ride dynamics for companies like RMC and Chance. I'm sure if B&M were to want to contract his company for those services, he would definitely be interested. B&M used to use Stengil's company for their ride dynamics, but I've been told they do that in house now. Funny thing to me is that Stengil used to do dynamics for both Intamin and B&M and we see how different those rides came out.
  23. Very cool pics! My girlfriend Lauren works for NASA and spends a lot of her days in the VAB. The big crane waaaay up top is "hers" and so are the platforms. I work on the Air Force side for Lockheed. It wasn't until I moved to FL and started working out here that I got a good appreciation for the size and scale of the entire space program, but it's pretty amazing once you get to witness some of it up close like you did. The SLS rocket will be a very impressive launch since it'll utilize a lot of the same hardware that the Shuttle program used. Think about two times as loud as the one today! It's pretty impressive to think you could sit the VAB overtop of either TTD or Kingda Ka and it would easily cover the towers! Indoor Dragster would a pretty awesome attraction!
  24. I remember this showing up on the Internet before Dragster was announced, because I was hoping that would be what CP was installing. I'd tend to think that it was a "fan" version, but the fact that they got the launch, the tower, and the brakes in the correct placement makes me think there's at least a chance this was considered for a concept. Considering Dragster already cost $25 million, maybe CP didn't want to spend another $10 mill on a fairly risky investment.
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