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Nothing is failsafe but in order for a braking system like that to totally fail, the main compressor would have to go down, every tank by every brake woulds have to lose pressure or there would have to be a leak at every set of brakes. All of that happening at the same time is near impossible, unless the pressure is released from all the tanks or the rubber balloons are cut, which again is near impossible since they are really thick rubber and are inside the brake, the brakes will still close. There is your failsafe. I agree about magnetic brakes, besides slowing the train a lot more smoothly there is really nothing to fail on them, unless they retract and don't move back to a braking position. But these and even the fixed magnetic brakes are far better and never wear out or require adjustment for the most part. Maybe Zamperla felt, for whatever reason magnetic brakes would not be a good idea here, I don't know why, they seem to work just fine on Intamin launch coasters. I'm thinking with this accident either the brakes did not close at all due to a sensor or PLC malfunction, or they did close but for whatever reason did not close tightly enough to stop the train. From what I remember from the pic it looks like there are two pairs of brakes on the launch track, four total, even if only one or two of those closed it should have been enough to at least slow the train to a stop well before it got near the station. In that case its possible they were not in proper adjustment or very worn, who knows. I just wish they would hurry up and figure out what happened.

That's good news for the park.

That makes sense and e stop would close all the brakes unless they totally failed, then it would not matter.

Since the injuries seem minor it seems like either the brakes did not stop it completely or the train was not going very fast and they did not close at all.

Hot sun + alcohol = NOT FUN!

^What trees?...lol

Thats right. On a launch coaster, you would not have anti rollbacks like you would find on a traditional lift hill, as those are designed to only allow the train to go one way and hold it in place if it stops. On a launch coaster, you would find some sort of braking on the launch track, pneumatic or magnetic, to safely bring the train to a stop if it rolls back and allow the train to be backed up, or reset, to the launch position. Anti rollbacks here would not only cause damage but injury as well from the immediate stopping of the train. I suppose you could have them on the inclie of the hill, but then if the train stops there the ride is down for a long time. With the current setup, the train just rolls back down, stops on the brakes, then is reset and the ride is going again. Not to mention it is far safer to evacuate a train on the flat launch track than it is on the incline of a hill, easier too. So far i have not seen any designer put anti rollbacks on the hills of launch coasters. Maybe it would be a good idea, so if the brakes totally fail, which appears to be what happened, there would not be a collision. But these brakes are not supposed to need a backup so if these did fail, something is seriously wrong. I wonder how far up the hill it went and how fast it was going when it hit the other train.

^ That's exactly what happened! Well at least the people who were injured seem to be ok... San Jose Mercury News

Looking at the picture again, these look very similar to the pinch type that Vekoma uses, where it must inflate a "rubber ballon" inside the brake to close them and leaf springs to open. If you think about it, this makes much more sense anyway, if it used springs to close them, they would have to be giant to provide enough of a pinch to stop the train. There are no giant springs on here. Compressed air provides much greater pinch force to grab and stop a multi ton train, and can easily be increased to stop even better. 100-150 psi is a lot of force, much more than could be provided by springs. I think the confusion is most assume it's the air that opens them but when you realize the air can hold them closed, with much greater force, even when the power is out because of the reserve tanks, and the solenoid valve must be energized to open them, this system is much safer and more reliable. I used to think that too, but after observation, research, and working with the people who actually know how this stuff works, I know differently. In fact I remember years ago on Demon, one of the balloons was coming out of the trim brakes, you could clearly see it flop around when it filled up with air, was kind of funny to see, but the brake still did its job. On these brakes you can clearly see on the end where the air line connects to the rubber balloon that runs inside each brake. One more thing, ever notice on this particular type of brake that you only hear the loud hiss of air escaping when they open but not when they close? There is the answer.

This is how it works...(pinch type brakes) The air compressor delivers compressed air to storage tanks by each set of brakes. Each tank has a regulator, which acts as a one way valve so air goes into the tanks but cannot backflow out of it. This allows the tanks to build up and store a volume of compressed air so it is always available for the brakes. The air line then goes from these tanks, through a solenoid valve, then to the brakes. Some brakes are single acting, meaning the air only closes them and springs open them. Some, like B&M or some others, are double acting, meaning air opens and closes them, so you are correct there. In single acting brakes, in order for them to open, the valve must be energized allowing the compressed air out of the brake cylinder, caliper, or rubber balloon and the springs to pull them open. When the valve is not energized, it allows compressed air to close the brakes. In double acting, the valve must energize to allow the air out on the "closing" side of the piston cylinder while at the same time allowing air into the "open" side, moving the brake from a closed to open position. When the valve is not energized, this action is reversed using the compressed air fron the storage tank to hold the brake closed. In both cases, when the valve is not energized the brakes are held closed by compressed air, which is the failsafe, if the power goes out the brakes cannot open, and can only open when the valve energizes. I am not an engineer, but I have studied this system very closely and worked with ride techs maintaining these systems. This is all from memory but I believe the basic description of operation is correct. These brakes appear to be the single acting pinch type, similar to Arrow, Vekoma, and what GCI uses, using air to close and springs to open. All of those are different in design but operate in a similar fashion. "And that concludes this episode of 'The Know-It-All'... Tune in next time to learn more useless and topic derailing information."

^Exactly! The ride should have stopped the train completely on its own. Unless this system is backwards, most if not all pneumatic braking systems use the air pressure to hold the brakes closed and springs to keep them open. With the air pressure closing the brakes this also has the advantage of being able to adjust how tightly the brakes grip so if the train does not stop in the proper place or fast enough the pressure can be adjusted to get the desired result. Unless there is a complete and total failure of the compressed air supply, there is always compressed air available to safely close the brakes due to the small storage tanks located near each set of brakes.

They would only, obviously, be on the flat section to slow, then stop the train from hitting the other one. This seems like two different failures... 1. The launch failed to propel the train fast enough 2. Because the launch failed, the train rolled back and should have been stopped, but for whatever reason it wasn't. And as was stated, the failsafe for pneumatic brakes is the closed position. The brakes should only ever open when a solenoid valve is energized to release the compressed air holding them closed, such as when a train is supposed to pass. The valve is de energized when the brakes are supposed to close which allows compressed air from the nearby storage tanks to close them. The failsafe to this is if there is a failure of the main compressor the brakes will still close using the stored compressed air in the small tank nearby, or if the power fails the brakes will close as there is no power to energize the solenoid valves that keep them open. With that being said, the brakes should have stopped the train unless they did not close at all or they did but did not have enough pressure to fully stop the train because of some kind of mechanical malfunction.

Maybe they got a good deal on those rides.

E stop in this instance should not matter. The normal operation of this ride should be the brakes close as soon as the train clears them. If the brakes malfunctioned an E stop would not matter. Bottom line is the ride should have safely stopped the train on its own with no human intervention but obviously failed so there is a serious problem there.

This is crazy.

So "land" refers to the animals "sea" refers to the aquatic animals "sky" refers to the rides Correct?

I'm impressed, this looks really fun. If only CGA would get a 200 foot version of this. Might as well, everyone else seems to be getting one. Eventhough this may not be as tall as some of the others, 150 feet for a swing ride is still thrilling. Should be a lot of fun.

Maybe that's it!

Since I can't go I'm looking forward to a photo trip report from someone.

If project 18 is a coaster, there's really nothing from stopping them from building around and over existing coasters, they've done it before, which means it could go anywhere. I like it when parks intertwine track from different rides, the mass of "steel fun" looks awesome.

Viper still seems like a popular ride. The only reason I think they would even consider removing it is if it has become too costly maintenance wise or if it has become like GASM. Unless someone can confirm it, it hasn't reached that point yet.

Scream is all around fun, there is no reason it should go.

That's funny, I knew I mentioned an idea a like that a few pages back, but with more to it.

Three? So that means "Mr. Six", Superman, and something else, but what? Or, are they counting Superman as two different experiences, forward and backward. If not then I have no idea what the third one could be.

That's funny that you say that, it does seem like there might be something else, maybe not an attraction (like a ride) but something significant.