ZeroGravity55

So I'm watching the webcam right now, and I know everyone said the lights flickered in the station when the train launches, but I didn't realize that all the lights in the plaza did as well. That was very cool to see on the webcam!

I have this sneaky suspicion that we're all talking about The Boss getting the RMC conversion, but we really need to be talking about the woodie next door. Wouldn't surprise me one bit if Eagle got the I-Box conversion.

^ He works at SFStL, so I'd say he's visited the park quite a few times.

Oh poo-poo, you got me! WICKED BURRRRRNNNN!! Thank you for the very enthralling and informative post. Really, a quality contribution. Says the person who complained about the lack of trees at a park that is practically built in the woods. TNT wins.

This is just like when we raise our prices 30 cents at work to help cover food costs. You get all the complaints from your regulars, because they're only ones who actually notice. They only make up about 0.5% of our customer count, so we usually ignore their complaints and if they feel the need to not visit us anymore, we don't sweat it. HW shouldn't care what these whiners have to say, as they only make up a very very small percentage of HW's actual attendance. They've treated them like royalty for 20 plus years and I bet they treated them just as well tonight. It's HW's ride, they can do what they want with it. If it SAVEs them money and helps IMPROVE guest experience among the majority of their visitors, it's worth it. Edit: I love that one of the complaints on the Holiwood nights FB page was that people who attended the event, paid to get in, so they are entitled to complain. No, no you're not. First off, the park gave you one heck of a deal and is probably not gaining any profit off this event whatsoever. Lastly, Paula posted on this site and the HWN FB page that The Voyage would be braked this year. She even stated that trains that are full will be braked more than the others because they will get to the MCBR faster than empty ones. So you were warned and could have backed out. BTW, I loved that someone deleted all the negative posts on the HWN FB page. I can just hear those whiners now... "this isn't the same HW".. No, it's the same, they just got tired of your arrogance after treating you so well for so long.

^^ They do and it's throughout the park. I don't recall how fast the connection is.

Mostly, this depends on the cooperation of the groups in line. The Groupers on Mammoth and Wildebeest are trained to ask the groups if they would like to have someone ride with them if their group is below is the capacity of the raft. If a lot of the groups say no, which is usually the case, then the single rider line can turn into a longer wait than the actual line itself. Everytime I visit the park, the single rider line is usually full of groups who think they can get on the ride faster by using it. Sure you weren't hearing the flywheels? They're quite loud. Honestly, people going to the park, who have no inclination of the back story, probably aren't going to understand it either. I believe the park has one the Koch sisters telling the story playing as you go through the queue? But, most people have short attention spans and won't pay attention to it. Incase you're wondering, here's the Legend of Thunderbird: In 1620, as the Mayflower neared the end of its 66 days at sea, a mighty storm nearly capsized the ship, taking it hundreds of miles off course. As passengers and crew feared all was lost, an immense bird appeared in the sky. The thunderbird, whose wings created the thunder and eyes flashed the lightning of the powerful storm, rescued the ship by launching it through the sky to the New World. Now there is a bit more to the story. This is where the whole 66 days at sea journal comes into play. They're telling the story that a the pilgrims eventually made their way to Indiana and buried the journal, so no one would have to deal with the wrath of Thunderbird? (Paula please help me if I'm wrong). Fast forward 100-200 years and a Indiana farmer discovers the journal and unleashes the wrath of Thunderbird. This is why you have all the farm theming. It's a bit far fetched and maybe a little complex, but at least they went all out instead of just naming it Thunderbird and not doing any theming. I don't think this something the park will do all the time.

It's the shocks in the wheel assemblies. This is what makes the ride feel so smooth. If you notice on all RMC coasters with RMC trains, they always make a squeaking sound going through airtimes hills or really tight turns. This is the shocks keeping the wheels in contact with the track at all times.

Medusa runs on steel wheels, and it absolutely rips through the course. As opposed to, for instance. Goliath, which runs on poly and has clearly lost a lot of speed by its final turn. Medusa uses nylon wheels.

Jumping the gun on next years expansion? lol We've been known to jump several years ahead on this thread... It's just what we do. I feel as though Holiday World is in a rather curious spot for 2016's expansion. Most of the time, you would ride the high of a new coaster's success going into the next couple of years, but the there are a couple of factors that think might change that thinking for the park. 1. They really need to do something with Pilgrim Plunges former site. 2. Dollywood, (who Holiday World considers to be one of their biggest competitors) is adding a new coaster and it really hasn't been a secret at all throughout the industry. I'm not saying the park should drop another 20 million dollar attraction, as that would be a horrible business decision imo. Now something that is very marketable and grabs people's attention in a Holiday World fashion? That is sort of what I'm expecting. I know the park is hoping to bring in a bunch of new guests this year and are able to retain them through their value, and charm, which I'm sure they will be able to for the most part. But as somebody who is in a management position at my job, anytime we're able to bring in new customers, we always go the extra mile to ensure they will return. So adding a little extra thrill to the park (weather it be in the water or dry park) wouldn't be a bad decision in my mind, especially when one of your top competitors is adding a major thrill (RMC launched coaster?). Just my line of thinking.

I thought the same thing too, but Six Flags Magic Mountain's president said that the I-Box track was a Six Flags exclusive (for the time being) during the opening ceremony yesterday.

^ The ride in Holidog Funtown and The Lewis and Clark are somewhat similar, but there is a huge difference in each of them. One of them allows the guests to control the speed and steer throughout the course, while the other moves at one speed and you have no control over it. Lewis and Clark trail serves a purpose as it's very popular among the younger guests because it affords them the opportunity to sort of drive although they are not old enough yet. I do hear you on the distance from the entrance of the park to Thunderbird. I think that's been a minor gripe from almost everyone that has visited the park this year. This was probably always going to be one of the downfalls of building a new coaster. Now while I do think the park will eventually add a second entrance, as they have the land available to definitely do it, I don't think they bring in enough people on a daily basis to warrant one yet. Now the easy answer to the problem is some type of chair lift. That answer doesn't come with it's problems though. First of all, they're probably going to have to redo the whole entrance plaza to the park to make it work. Then you have to worry about getting the lift high enough in the air that it clears all the rides and trees, while keeping it low enough to the ground so it doesn't compromise the safety of the guests and makes it easy to evacuate in case of an emergency. Honestly, I don't think the park is going to want have to go through trouble of trying to put one in will gladly wait until their busy enough to build a new entrance. By that time, there will be more rides out by Thunderbird and it'll be worth the walk out there.

^ I haven't attended Rock The World, but I'm 99.9% sure someone on here did at one time and said it was pretty crowded.

^ Yes. I don't think any of these announced parks that are supposed to be built in Texas will ever come to life. Hard Rock Park had the right funding and the ride idea, they just chose the wrong location. Had they built it in Houston, the park may have had some legs to stand on.

^ That's great to hear! A few people I went to junior college with were at the park yesterday and I just got done speaking to them. All I asked them was how their trip went and the first words out of their mouths were about how incredible Thunderbird was (keep in mind that they are non-enthusiasts). They went on for about 5 mins about the ride. The only thing I was thinking the whole time was that Holiday World has a huge winner on their hands. There is a lot of buzz about Holiday World throughout the surrounding area and hopefully beyond. Hoping to hear about a record breaking season at the end of the year and really looking forward to some 2016 speculation. Really interested to see what the park does to follow up Thunderbird.

Honestly, It seems to me that this probably happens a lot on The Legend and Raven. Especially more so on The Legend where a lot of laterals are in play causing the structure to shift to the right or left (The spot pictured on The Legend being one of them). As others above have said, those boards really play no importance in supporting the actual ride other than to connect each bent together. So I say after many years of the structure shifting and the vibrations from the train passing through, the boards and the nails holding them worked their way back out. While on the subject of The Legend's structure, I remember somebody posting on here saything that The Legend was the most over-supported roller coaster they've ever seen. One: the ride itself sits on a hill side, which means the highest points of the structure catches a lot of wind and could cause it sway. Two: The extreme laterals call for a wide support structure in the turns. I feel like The Legend is a very underrated coaster. The turn right after you pass under the lift gets me everytime as I tend to forget how extremely you're thrown to the left of the train. I always thought it would be cool if they could remove the seat dividers and create that Scrambler effect of feeling like you're going to end up in the others person lap when you go through the turns. Also, for some reason I just love the wolf howling sound when the train gets ready to make it's first drop. Not so much on the ride, but I love hearing it throughout the park.

Now that finals are over, I've been able to catch back up on this thread. For all the issues that happened yesterday, it's really misfortunate. Seems to me, a lot of the issues are a result of it just being early season issues and quirks that the park is having to work through as they pop up. They're still on weekends only, so the rides all sit for five days without being used and then are fired up to run a few hours before the park opens up. I'll liken this to like getting in your car in starting it up. If you turn your car on after it sits for five days and the check engine light is on, if you don't notice anything wrong, you're probably going to drive it anyway and get it checked out later. When this happens at a place like Holiday World, they have to get it checked out immediately, whether it's a big or small problem, because of the chance it may compromise the safety of their guests. Give the park's maintenance team some time with Thunderbird. They're still probably learning a bunch of stuff with the PLC's on this ride and lot of this stuff can probably only be learned by something not working right and them having to fix it. The silver lining in this is that whenever this issue pops up again, they'll probably have a solution and be able to fix it faster. As for The Voyage, it was probably track repairs that got delayed while they tried to get Thunderbird open. While not ideal, they can live with The Voyage being down for awhile, but as for Thunderbird, they need it open for every minute the park is operating. It's their main draw, and it was probably all hands on deck with their maintenance team to try and resolve the issue.

This was sort of inspired by The Voyage and my thought that an inversion would look cool in place of the S-Curve that goes over the beginning of the lift. I give to you, Firebolt:

Great pictures! This ride looks crazy! When The Voyage was being designed, HW's maintenance team actually requested that they design the storage area to where the trains rest on the upstop wheels. This supposedly makes it easier to get up under the trains to work on stuff and inspect them.

The only reason this ride has good pacing is because of the shorter trains.

The ride really isn't in a sad state. The park has replaced more track than any previous year and many people who have rode it this year have stated that it's running in top notch form. Robb and others have simply stated the ride really isn't their type of ride. The second half of the ride is very aggressive and was designed to be that way. While the park is in charge of maintaining the coaster, I do agree that The Gravity Group has dropped the ball several times. The steel structure would supposedly help the park delay major track work.. hundreds of feet of track was replaced after one year of operation. They couldn't deliver trains that were supposedly designed with The Voyage in mind. Now to be fair, TGG did redesign the turnaround going into the first 90 degree turn in the spaghetti bowl and it has held up really good ever since then. Now I can't speak for this season yet, but I've yet to read any complaints about it. As for the ride as it sits today. I would venture out to say that all the money they have spent to maintain the ride has been worth it. All the awards and accolades have made the ride extremely marketable and the ride is still extremely marketable as it sits. Now, I do believe a more permanent solution for The Voyage is in the ride's future. The park would be crazy not to notice what RMC has been doing and how their track technology is saving parks a ton of money, and creating a better ride experience for those parks guests. The layout of the ride doesn't even need to change. A full topper track retrofit with RMC trains would do the trick. This would still allow the park to market the ride as a wooden coaster. Now I wouldn't be against RMC tightening up some of the airtime hills to get more extreme airtime.

^ Actually, the prices didn't go up from last year. I was planning on visiting today until I went to go submit my 20 page research paper for my holocaust class last night. Much to my dismay, when I went to submit it, there was no file for it. So yeah, you can kind of guess how my day as went, especially with a 8:00 p.m. deadline. Luckily, I have next Sunday off and will be visiting the park then. I saw a few posts on Holiday World's FB page and it looks like I missed out on a good day to visit. Also, someone posted picture on HW's FB confirming that they did indeed put a Strike-U-Up where Sparkler was located.

^ How old is that photo? There is still Fury track sitting on a trailer ready to be shipped and I'm 100% sure that is Baron track.

I honestly find it sad that you even had to respond to this whole situation. I'm just glad you didn't have to defend Will's wife and children on this website like you did on the Holiwood Nights FB page. It's sad that some enthusiasts take this hobby way too seriously and get all up in arms about the use of a trim/block break on a roller coaster. It's pathetic that some of them would go as low as taking personal shots at the family over it. I've really enjoyed reading everyones reports so far. With the threat of rain most of the day tomorrow in Santa Claus, I'm going to hold out until Sunday to visit. Hoping for some good weather on Sunday and I'll hopefully be able to get some good pictures. This is the first time I'm actually bringing a camera into the park.

That first shot/picture