coasterkid124

So, this morning I got a call from my company that they were closed for the day due to a water main break close to the office. While most people would be overjoyed, it kind of sucks for me because that means I won't be getting paid. Seeing that nearly all of my other friends and family were busy today, I took a quick trip up to my home park, Darien Lake. This is my first big photo TR, and I have a few warnings. I do not own any fancy equipment. All pictures were taken using my Samsung Galaxy. While it is a pretty good camera, I'm sure not all pictures will be of magnificent 4k quality. Darien Lake's setting reminds me of Holiday World a lot. It's kind of in the middle of nowhere in farm country, but has great landscaping, a large waterpark, and a friendly atmosphere. Many of DL's coasters are cloned, but there are a few gems which we will get to. Overall, I think Ride of Steel alone makes this a place to get to at least once, and you could create a multi-day trip with their hotel and campground. The park could REALLY use another coaster to draw people in a little more, but it is a great park to visit for a credit run and to ride some of the unique flats they have. Onto the pictures! Ironically, my Rav4 is parked in the Rav4 lot. I swear I didn't plan this! It's nearly 90 degrees out today. I can't believe nobody is in line for this water ride. The guy in the dark brown shirt and tan cap is park GM Chris Thorpe. He's currently in his second stint with the park and is doing a wonderful job despite the cards he was dealt. He was on his way to wipe off a bench with some napkins. You just don't see corporate guys this committed anymore. One of DL's rare flats, Haymaker. Basically a paratrooper built by a company called Heintz Fahtze. They only built a few rides. Some parks have mandatory pictures. This is basically Darien Lake's mandatory shot. Brand new train that is the envy of the other two Superman "clones". Generic T-bars with no brackets or giant thigh crushing cushions. Hopefully next year they order another one. One train operations at this park is killing me on busy days. No, it's not a two tone paint job. Darien Lake just never finishes paint jobs anymore. I believe their contractor is Professor Calamitous. Up, up, and away! This finale sure as hell beats Millennium Force's sorry excuse for one. (Sorry CP fanboys, it's true) Nobody wincing now that the restraints are heavenly. One of the new panels installed with the new train. The only downside is now they have to unlock the entire train if there is an issue. They cannot unlock specific rows anymore. I didn't want these people to think I'm a pedophile taking a picture of this kid, but here's a good shot of the new restraints. I will never break the chain (Happy birthday to Fleetwood Mac's Christine McVie!) They should name this ride Faded Glory. The paint already fits the theme. Yeah, this ride is rough. And everyone hates it. But it's still my second favorite in the park. Great Airtime and laterals all over. New wood. RMC confirmed. Predator was closed for the moment, which was a sigh of relief for my back and neck Utility marking across from Predator. RMC confirmed x2 The Boardwalk area was recently redone by Herschend. Looks very nice. Not sure what Ride of the Week even means, but it wasn't enough to convince me to ride. My finger was very excited about it though. These girls don't look ready to Blast Off. Too bad! The Anchor Bar is the reason why we have chicken wings. The Boomerang is the reason why we have Tylenol. That's false advertisement. They don't even repair canoes. I asked! It's tough getting a good photo of the Giant Wheel because it's so huge. P.S. CP Fanboys, ours is bigger. Whatcha gonna do about it? DL has some great landscaping, and some not so great coasters. At least they look nice. (Actually, our Boomerang is pretty smooth) Twister has been down long term for two years now. Wish they would replace it like many other parks are doing. World's second Batwing. Since Orient Express is gone, that makes this the oldest. Prepare for whiplash! This security guard did nothing to protect those poor people! While a night picture of this would be beautiful, our wheel is lit by only big ugly flood lights. World's first coaster to go upside down five times. Impressive! Second train coming soon... The yellow grass is a good indicator of how hot and dry it's been for the last couple of weeks Ranger is gone now. It only sat SBNO for like two years. Honestly the dead grass that replaced it looks much better too. Now here's a story about one of my rides on Viper today. As I was riding in the last car, two knuckleheads in front of me thought it would be a genius ides to light up a blunt while we were on the lift hill. Maybe they were trying to avoid the whiplash of the batwing, or maybe they were just that plain dumb. As we were going through the corkscrew, one of them dropped it and it missed my face by a few inches. Why do people nowadays have to ruin things for others? You cannot just ride the roller coaster like everyone else? You need a blunt to make a theme park more enjoyable? This is why people aggravate me so much. I didn't let it ruin my day, but it did bug me. the security office is conveniently located next to Viper's exit, so I took a minute to report it. Thanks for reading! Part two coming soon!

Yeah, it's definitely one of the smoothest. If all Boomerangs rode like that one, I think more people would like them. If I remember correctly, I think Flashback was about middle of the road out of all the Boomerangs I have been on. I wonder if SF would ever consider replacing Goliath with a Mack Power Splash seeing that the Dubai park will be getting one.

^It's included with admission. I would recommend hitting Brain Drain early. It's the best slide in the water park and gets mobbed the longer the day goes on.

This park is just a laughing matter this season. I won't be back for a while until things or management are shaken up. It's really a shame because Superman is one of my favorite coasters, and Wicked Cyclone is the closest RMC to me. Between the VR, assigned seats, and Goliath problems, everything this year is a mess. I know that my petty little boycott doesn't mean anything in the grand scheme of things, but I feel that most people agree with me. I cannot see myself spending time and money on a possible trip here if I will not enjoy the visit with all of these little annoyances.

The only thing that the proximity sensors can do is detect where a train is. They do not monitor restraints or air pressure or anything like that. There are specific sensors that track those things but they are not bolted to the track. Most of those sensors are unseen by the riders as they are either built into the train or other safety mechanisms. All of these sensors do connect to the computer though, and can cause a shutdown if something goes wrong. The only time the computer has contact with a train is when they are on a conductor rail. When the train leaves the station, the computer moves onto the next train and cannot control anything on the dispatched train until it returns. RoS now has three of these rails (station, brake run, and transfer). I believe that the two latter rails have only been added there to release restraints in the event of an evac. When a train is evacuated anywhere that is not on a conductor rail, maintenance needs an exterior power source to unlock the train. RMC has found away around this long process by installing manual unlock valves on their restraint cylinders. The train will usually stop in a few certain places on the lift if there is a safety stop by the computer just as dgkallday said. One is at the top of the lift before the first car crests the hill, and the other is very low, usually just as the last car engages on the lift and the motor kicks into high speed. There aren't really any proxy switches mid-lift, so if a train stops there, it is either an operator initiated e-stop, or a major fault in the computer that e-stops the ride.

I finally have an excuse to use this

That doesn't change the fact that CNL doesn't want to invest though. They do control capital investments because they technically own the land and the rides. From a corporate press release: Premier likely doesn't want to use their operational budget on new trains and repairs and such, because they won't end up owning any of it if they terminate their lease. It's very likely that CNL were the ones that had to purchase the new RoS train this season or risk losing it to Premier if they left. This whole joint operation just doesn't work. CNL doesn't like putting in large attractions, and the operators of the park don't feel the need to fix rides that aren't theirs because in the end they have to make profit too. CNL isn't exactly totally at fault in every situation, but the park would be in much better hands with a company that could control all aspects of the budget and investment.

^^^^While you are right about the computer being extremely sensitive, it can only check restraints in the station. Most of the faults I remembered that would shut the ride down related to sensors, air pressure, and the occasional "ghost fault". This is what we called it when something strange or unknown shut the ride down and the system just needed a reset. Unless a restraint is broken, the ride really only monitors how tight they are. It isn't just RoS, all Intamins have these issues. In regards to CNL, they don't control operations, but what they do control is the budget. The blame really does go back to them because they aren't ever looking to invest. Darien Lake isn't an amusement park to them. It's a property number and a statistic. They want to see how much revenue they are making off of it and want to spend as little as possible. I bet Premier does want to run multiple trains. Doug alluded to it last year when he said that it was a moving goal. But if they are only given x amount of dollars each year in maintenance, they cannot overspend unless any additional funds are approved by the owners. How can they be expected to fix things up when they just aren't given the funds to? The Six Flags blame game isn't relevant either anymore. They have been gone for 10 years now. And when they were running the park, things weren't in the greatest condition, but at least they kept multiple trains running and rides weren't SBNO all year. If asked, they did give the park the resources needed to keep rides working.

If anything, I really think that Cedar Fair will RMC Mean Streak and see how it turns out before doing any other projects. They want to see what type of draw it will bring to the park and if the refurbishment investment outweighs or equals that of building a new coaster entirely. IOE has done a lot of independent work, they aren't solely an RMC contractor. They even updated the controls for Valleyfair's Mad Mouse last year.

Well the Frog Hopper worked well for Hershey, and they even put in two to boost capacity. I could definitely see them going the S&S route again. I would prefer an Intamin, but I do enjoy the S&S models as well.

It definitely does improve rider comfort more, and the trains make the ride feel a tad quicker when it warms up. They seem to be more accommodating of larger riders as well. I haven't seen a "walk of shame" yet this season. In previous years, riders sometimes got kicked off nearly every other train. There is still a little rattle near the back of the train, but honestly it does not affect the ride much for me and many of the older Intamins are generating this issue anyways. Out of the three Superman hypers, I would say that ours currently has the best trains. SFA is still running old stock with the bracket T-bars, and SFNE went second generation, but messed up the restraints.

That is true. The transfer under the station was used to store the third train if need be. From what I remember, it was similar to Loch Ness Monster's set up. They used to be able to winch the train up from under there, but now I believe that they use a crane to set them up each season. Last season they didn't have the second train ready until the end of July or August, so that may be their target again (makes little sense to me to run two trains for only one month though). ^^^DJ is one of the best ops at the park. He always makes jokes and is upbeat about his job. He reminds me of a Cedar Point operator because not only is he upbeat, but he keeps the line moving. I believe he also runs Haymaker, Lasso, and possibly Scrambler on some days. The Predator ops are generally happy too, but they could speed up the loading process. I think that I consistently have had the best operations at Viper. Always quick and jolly with everyone. I usually strike a conversation with them while waiting for the train to return.

I second this. I visited on a not so busy day earlier in May, but Fastlane + made my 8 hours at the park great. I got on all major coasters and some flats with minimal waits. I avoided huge waits for Maverick and Valravn, and got re-rides on pretty much anything I wanted.

A lot of cookie cutters here. Too bad they couldn't expand on the designs a little bit more. But a couple of those coasters are intriguing. Looks like a large scale Premier coaster with a loop in the entrance plaza.

Retracking on Phoenix? It was butter smooth last year when I rode it. I wish that some parks would put in a 1/4 as much effort on their coasters.

Update from Screamscape for those who may not have seen it... I find it amazing that for a park who just a few years ago wanted to fix operations, rides, etc. with their "Happiness Guaranteed" slogan now is cutting corners trying to get away with one train on all coasters. Maybe their excuse is the budget or "not enough riders". But Lance brings up a good point. With no spare trains, RoS will go down possibly for very long periods if something goes wrong. Also, for a park of this size there's no reason for lines to get up to 45-60 minutes on a busy day because of a lack of trains. I was starting to like Premier, but stuff like this makes Six Flags look like Disney when it comes to operations. Plus with the half paint jobs and SBNO rides, the park isn't going anywhere. Whatever happened to the rumors that CNL was liquidating or got their investment back? I honestly just want a company to come in who will run the park right and invest a little into fixing it up.

Looks like Viper is the only coaster to run two trains this season once again. I talked to the crew today about some basic things going around the park, nothing special to note besides they expect the second train to go on sometime this month. That's a good catch on Predator Steve. I never noticed that, but that pretty much rules out a second train this year. I wish that they would send the trains off to PTC this offseason so they can rehab the trains. It's a coaster that could use them. Seems like most people have just been hitting Ride of Steel on a bad day this year. Every time I went, it has been suffering from minimal downtime. Sometimes there are just days where the computer doesn't want to cooperate. Today weather kept it and many other rides down for a bit. The wind got so bad at a point that it nearly blew one of Big Kahuna's rafts across the park. Only the conveyor's cage prevented that from happening. I would be happy if next year's budget was used to finish paint on Mind Eraser and start RoS, get second trains for major rides running, and a small dry addition, maybe a Twister replacement.

I call bs on those. No signs of any second trains this weekend, and Mind Eraser's pathway was completely open. Maybe it was just down for maintenance because as of last year when ME is shut down, they post someone in front of the path and shut the whole thing down.

Yeah the guy working at the saloon isn't a credible source. Nobody knows what the park is getting next year, let alone two years away. I'm sorry but im not buying into anything until i see it. I remember a couple of years ago when a ride op at Predator said that the park was building "the world's tallest coaster like Cedar Point has".

I'm not sure how packed a park like SFNE gets, but a 55 minute wait for a Thursday in June does not sound good. We don't even get that on our Darien Lake model with one train operations, on a weekend, with a crew that has a pulse only 31% of the time.

Have you posted a review by any chance? It's only very recently that I've seen anything but fairly extreme criticism of the place, to the point that I've been strongly considering not going there even knowing that Silver Comet is often considered worth riding. Don't mean to hijack the Knoebels thread, but seeing that you asked, and there's no place to discuss it.... I live less than half an hour away from the park, and haven't visited in 3 years now. Main reasons being that Darien Lake is about the same distance away, plus even Silver Comet is not worth it anymore. It's not a balanced ride, so you only get good airtime near the very front, and that's hard to do because they assign seats. The loading process is horrible. You cannot touch the lap bars or they restart the process. It takes about 5 minutes to dispatch and they only have one train. It's a very nice park don't get me wrong. I used to enjoy visiting 2-3 times a year. But now the current attractions and operations kind of got old to me, and I would prefer Darien Lake any day family-wise or self-wise.

Here's my point of view on Twister. I don't dislike the ride one bit. It used to be one of my favorite rides in the whole park. But it has been years since it's been run correctly. I haven't seen a multiple flip cycle in years, and the waterfall doesn't even work most days. Last year it was down all year from the braking issues, now this isn't looking too good. From what I've seen, it seems like more problems pertaining to the pneumatic (air) system. It's what the restraints and braking mechanism both work on, so I'm guessing that maintenance decided to overhaul the entire system over two years. But why don't they do these repairs in the offseason? They must have known that it was about time that these things had to be replaced. Many parks are beginning to remove their Top Spins, and it's not a coincidence. They require a lot of maintenance and work. Knott's Riptide, Ripsaw, and SFNE's Twister have all been taken out over the past few years. And these are major parks who have a larger budget to maintain them.

There was one behind it last year as well to repair it. I believe that it only ran for a few weeks in total last season. At this point they should just replace it. Even if it reopens, it isn't going to run a good cycle. I'd rather see them put any money that they were going to use on that towards getting second trains running.

I'm not sure about Hershey's height limit, because I've heard reports both ways, so it might only affect certain areas of the park. Remember that Kissing Tower is 250 ft. I think that the controversy surrounding Skyrush was its proximity to Comet, and the fact that it goes over the water. A drop tower would be perfect. People have been asking for one for years. A Sky Jump model would be enough to make me visit again (as if Skyrush already wasn't enough of a reason).

^Of course this is purely speculation, but they may be trying to launch it but the system keeps giving errors. I hope this situation gets ironed out soon. I would hate to see more parks reluctant to purchase a similar model from RMC.