BDG

If you look closely, there's a ferris wheel too.

Congratulations !!

The Tussaud's Group was bought by Dubai International Capital in 2005 for 1.5 billion US dollar. DIC is an investment arm of Dubai Holding, which is owned by the Dubai Crown Prince Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. They have tons of money and usually buy 3 or 4 companies each year, or shares in those companies, for 1 billion US dollar each. "We now look forward to working closely with DIC to accelerate our growth plans, explore new opportunities and create even more exciting experiences for our 14 million guests" said the Tussauds CEO.

Not stock, clones. Stock: a model in the catalogue (like Vekoma's Boomerang and SLC) Clone: a ride built for a certain park, then cloned / rebuilt for another park

That's early. Is the park open all year round ? Looks like an awesome ride.

Great finds.

Our German friends at Freizeitparkweb have a new forum thread with tons of information regarding the building permission of Desert Race (their new-for-2007 Accelerator), which contains loads of yada-yada regarding the noise levels in the entire park. Quite interesting, since there's talk of the infamous Giga Coaster the park has been planning since 2002. The project was long rumoured to have been cancelled, or seriously delayed, because of budgetary reasons as well as the lack of a building permission. According to the documents discovered, it seems the ride has a new location, the area behind the bobsled and free-fall tower. There's a race track there, for those who visited and/or know the park. This location is better than the original planned location (where Desert Race is being built), because it's the furthest away from the nearby villages and it's shaped like a little valley, further blocking the sound of the ride and the noise of screaming passenger. In fact, the location is so perfect, the park already has the building permit for the Giga Coaster ! Since the end of 2005 ! We now even know the (temporary ?) stats: height: 101m (331.36 feet) length: 2250m (7381.89 feet) 82 degrees steep first drop top speed: 155 kph (96.31 mph) Adding to the excitement is the fact that land clearing is going on at this new location. The park has the building permit and with the new investors from Dubai, I don't think money is a problem... To be continued... http://freizeitparkweb.de/cgi-bin/dcf/dcboard.cgi?az=show_thread&om=567&forum=DCForumID31&viewmode=all (Giga stuff starts at reply 25)

What's up with all the trimbrake-bashers ? EGF is like non-stop speed, even with the unnoticable trims. Goliath on the otherhand has the slowest bückels and if it weren't for the ground-hugging helixes, there would be no speed at all. I like it's setting/location, I like the colors, I like the first hill and I like the Stengel dive. But right after that element, the fun is gone. It loses it's speed and the lay-out is uninspired. The ground-hugging final curve is a decent finale, but it doesn't make me forget the boring "middle-half". Overall, the ride is mediocre at best. A 6/10 maybe.

When I saw the thread title, I thought "wtf is that shit ?!" Then I figured it must've been a Dutch guy who started the thread, and guess what, I was right. Expedition GeForce is number one, especially compared to Goliath.

No they don't. As I said in my previous post, most companies use their own programs and plugins.

Yes, but only for 3D sketches or presentations. It's an easy-to-use tool to show the press an on-ride video or off-ride impressions without having to render it in advance. But to actually design and calculate, they use professional software (Solidworks, Catia, SolidWorks, AutoCAD, etc.) tuned and customised with their own programs.

1. It has to fit in the park, more specifically the area of the new roller coaster. This includes the topography (the shape of the land), but also buildings, rides, trees, paths, etc. either existing or to be built. 2. Usually, parks have a height limit. And budget restricts them to a certain height and length too. Thus, designers have to work within those boundaries as well. 3. Finally, it's a matter of putting as much fun into a track as long as possible. Most designers have enough experience and/or knowledge to sketch a lay-out, then calculate the exact heights, banking, slope, support placement, etc. They also have computer programs that do alot of the work.

Who says they have the (a) patent on that lay-out ?

Good name.

http://hight3ch.com/post/robotic-arm-ride/ (with video) Awesome. photo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcHE7DMGMIc A video of Plopsaland Indoor, with the background music being the music this news item is about. The translation of the chorus (starts at 00:36) where Gert mentions the chocolate and lemonade...it's very cheerful and happy, and it rhymes. But in English, not so much, but at least you'll understand what it's about... if you had ten million what would you then do have a party and spend your money I'd buy litres lemonade hundred kilo chocolate to give away to everyone if you had ten million what would you then do have a party and spend your money I'd have a funfair built and yell it off the roofs come all and play with me ! He already has the funfair (theme parks), now all he had to do was invite a few thousand people and give them lemonade and chocolate.

Seems very nicely decorated, this park needs more themed areas.

Cool, looks like a great place to work. Don't mess anything up for Toverland !

They could make a Six Flags theme park game for the Wii, featuring all the typical theme park / funfair games like whack-a-mole, the little ducks to catch/fish, the hammer hitting game, tin can alley, ring-toss, horse races, skeeball, shooting galleries, etc.

Daylight: Katun or Black Mamba Night: Katun, it has lights !

Coca-Cola Before that, Dr. Pepper, which I have to get in Holland nowadays. For some unknown reason, there's no Dr. Pepper in Belgium anymore.

Vegetarian.

possible: floorless -> sitting sitting -> floorless stand-up -> sitting / floorless diving -> floorless diving floorless diving -> diving possible, but useless restraints: mega -> sitting / floorless not possible: inverted -> flying flying -> inverted sitting / floorless -> stand-up sitting / floorless -> mega inverted / flying -> sitting / floorless / mega / diving sitting / floorless / mega / diving -> inverted / flying Six Flags needs magical trains that don't require any maintenance.

Key to success: Fast Pass With three days, take two days for Disneyland, one for the Studios. Day one: Disneyland -> ride as much as you can, use the park map as a tick list Day two: Studios -> you should be able to ride & see everything Day three: Disneyland -> ride whatever you missed on day one, and ride again what you like, maybe see a parade Don't forget the attractions easily missed by most: Storybook Land, Nemo's submarine, the Robinson tree house, the Sleeping Beauty castle tour, the dragon's cave underneath, Skull Rock, the labyrinth of Alice in Wonderland, etc.

Two B&M's less. Flashback was designed by Walter & Claude, while Psyclone ran with B&M manufactured trains. Flashback was a milestone in roller coaster history. It featured the first box track design, which was neccesary to construct the (also first) "space curves". Over 1000 coordinates were used to make sure those diving curves were as smooth as possible. Werner Stengel (who came up with the idea) already proposed it to Schwarzkopf back in the seventies, who found it too difficult to manufacturer and stayed with the tubular backbone. Another fun fact, the tight Raumkurve (space curve) turns are only 6m (19.7 ft) in diameter and you go through them at a speed of 61 kph (37.9 mph), yet you only have 0.75 lateral G-forces. A wide, 23m (75.5 ft) diameter Jet Star 3 curve, had 0.9 G. This spectacular mathematical feat, was the work of Harald Wanner, a very skilled technican, still working at the Stengel bureau.