coasterkid124

The only company that still makes a similar model is Fabbri, who I'm unsure that Cedar Fair would do business with as they are more of an uncommon company in North America. CF works on a loyalty system and usually they keep going back to the same manufacturers for new attractions. The new Enterprise model is intriguing though. I'm not sure why they died out in the first place, as wherever I go they seem popular. Could be a great way to refurb old models and make them more efficient again.

Probably mentioned already, but I could create an amazing coaster with elements that everybody will like, but it would not be feasible in real life. With an unlimited budget though, I could create something with all of Intamin's features, and the comfort of B&M (for the most part).

1. Basketballs 2. People who ask dumb questions (Is the ride broke? *coaster stuck on lift*) 3. Slow ops who talk more than check restraints 4. People with rumors (I heard someone died on top of this) 5. Know it alls 6. Screaming Kids 7. Games people who harass you 8. One train ops when lines are 45+ minutes (Looking at you Darien Lake) 9. Ops who spend 10 minutes trying to staple someone who clearly doesn’t fit 10. When maintenance takes longer to get to a ride than to fix it 11. People afraid to enter the station so they hold up the line 12. People who don’t know where to sit 13. People who take too long to put aside loose articles 14. When employees stop you to take your picture 15. When parks won’t let you in until the exact minute it opens 16. People who talk about how much better another park is at your home park Rant over. But here are the main one of mine from skimming through the thread.

Like, what the H-E-double-hockey sticks happened, did CNL really stopped caring about Darrien Lake? They never really cared about any properties. They are simply an investment company who buys a boat load of properties, and makes as much profit as they can off of them. CNL owns hundreds of properties, so it's hard for them to "care" about any single one to a large extent. It's different if an actual theme park company owned the park, as their portfolio is smaller, and they will actually invest to make the park better not the company.

I wonder if there could ever be a way for parks to incorporate a system like at SFoT, with the zippered baggies, but in a larger form for backpacks. I'm sure that most trains wouldn't have the room, but some could like PTCs. Or it could be somehow mounted to the backs of cars and/or seats, but there could be a fear of things getting caught in the wheels or the chassis.

I remember a couple of years ago a rumor of a ZacSpin being built here with a WWII plane theme. It was on a guest survey or something. As the S&S 4D coaster seems to be successful at Fiesta Texas, it may be a good replacement for the Bobsleds. It's a nice compact coaster for the smaller park. It could be a great fit.

Boomerang really shouldn't be a surprise either. They never fixed the original hydraulic problem with it that was still lingering from last year. From what I've seen this year, it still was crawling up both lifts and straining to do so. It also seems like for the fourth (?) consecutive season there will not be two train ops, as daily operation is coming quick and there are no signs of spare trains. Unless maintenance is quick it would be a stretch to assemble and test all of them by July. Who does the park have to blame this year? Six Flags again?

Well, hopefully whoever owns the park at the start of next year commits to building big, while fixing the little things like Hooks. I must say that I am actually more enticed about who the park will be sold to, rather than new attractions for next year (which I still hope will happen).

I agree that the park should get a new play area in the water park. Hooks will be 20 years old next year, which is old for a water attraction to begin with. Most of the features have either been removed for safety issues or cannot be fixed because the manufacturer went out of business. The bucket was most likely removed for safety, as the area was poorly designed. There's a slope near the area that the water splashed, and apparently a lot of people were falling on it. I wouldn't mind a new one altogether from ProSlide. The water park has kind of gotten away from the pirate theming, and just more generic. So even a plain colorful theme would be good enough. Plus, with a better design, the bucket feature could return as it was the most popular element.

So you know for certain fact that there is no possible way that Goliath's lift chain could be repaired any faster without disregarding safety of the riders? I'd be interested to know how you know that. Lift refurb doesn't sound just like a broken chain. That could be fixed relatively quickly. Inspectors are Nazis with the following of safety standards, and if they don't like how a step felt on the catwalk, they could force the park to replace the whole thing if they wanted to. That ferris wheel is laughable. Did the local carnival set up at the wrong fairgrounds?

Sorry, I made an error while quoting disregard this post.

Couldn't this be said of all of B&M's coasters/ride styles? I think it's clear B&M is going to be their choice of manufacturer regardless of what the ride ends up being, I'm just slightly disappointed B&M hasn't come up with any other new and exciting concepts for one of their biggest clients since the wing coasters. "OK B&M, it's time for a new ride. What else ya got?" "Well, these dive coasters used to be a big deal." "Sure, I'll take it, just make sure it's the tallest one you've built so far." It still astonishes me that out of the near 100 coasters that B&M has built, not one has closed yet. Even the old stand-ups like Mantis and Vortex were close, but now can become great rides again with the floorless trains. However, B&M does have some limitations. Cost is a big one. Compared to what Intamin can build in a set amount of money, B&M probably would fail to meet a similar design with that amount and not be as forceful either. Plus B&M has always been the second manufacturer to introduce elements (modernly speaking). They were second to agree to build 300+ feet, and took over 20 years to make their first launching coaster. If a park wants something totally new or record breaking, Intamin has usually been called for, even if it involves technical bugs frequently. Look at TTD. Despite it being so inconsistent, over 10 years later it is still in operation and can still do what is required to make it rideable. I'm pretty sure that this project will be a B&M unless it is something truly unique and possibly record breaking.

Does anybody know if the park lets people riding bikes inthe parking lot? I have a parking pass so its not like I'm trying to circumvent the fee

I really hope that they do not remove Disco H20 but I'm not exactly sure how it could be rethemed to a volcano theme.

Not unless you're Jeff Johnson. Test Track rides are powered, so technically they're not coasters

Strange that despite all of the effort taken to take down theming, Smiler is still listed first under rides on their website, and everything is normal besides a small note saying "The Smiler is currently closed".

I think Hershcend had plans to give the Ride of Steel/Predator area a makeover like they did with the boardwalk area and Rowdy's Ridge and if Hershcend buys Darien Lake from CNL we might see some new water slides or something in where 'Cuda Falls was, it was a pile of weeds last time I checked. These were two areas that were the first to likely be touched if Herschend had full control. I could see them expanding past RoS into the Fright Fest area, because it is never used. For the Cuda Falls plot, the way I see it, Herschend would do one of two things. One would be one large addition, like a Firechaser Express or Wild Eagle (although due to cost this is more unlikely). Another could be a larger plaza full of little additions like Fireman's Landing at SDC. More likely I see something like a coaster, as less land work would be needed. The goal of the park was to keep retiring old attractions and bringing in new ones. The Scrambler (in 2012), Raging Seas, UFO, Cuda Falls, and Ranger were being closed on a yearly basis so new things could be added. One could bet that Predator would have been next. Herschend believed that if they invested, they could revitalize the park and bring it up to the next level. This.

I'm very surprised that Cedar Point hasn't been mentioned yet. Not trying to be a fan boy here or anything, it's just my personal opinion after going to many major parks. I feel like Disney, despite great service and theming, is very family oriented. They have a few bigger rides but none that are based on my personal prefrences, these being airtime, inversions, etc. Maybe it's because I don't have kids or something, but I prefer intensity over theming. Parks like Dollywood, SDC, etc. are on the rise but don't have the quantity that CP does. Living in Western NY, there aren't many great parks to choose from (Darien Lake being the largest). So a trip to Cedar Point is a real treat for me. I have never been majorly upset about much whenever visiting. The crews are upbeat and lightning quick, and although there is a Fast Lane, the park keeps guests in the queue entertained with the music and TVs. An hour wait may feel like 30 minutes. The choice of rides fits everyone as well. Big or small there is enough to do there so that a multi day stay is pretty much necessary. The rides are amazing. Mean Streak is really the only ride that is bad (and it's not to bad compared to others). Plus the park is adding something major every few years. Overall upkeep and maintenance in the park is extraordinary. The midway is beautifully landscaped and clean, and other sections look great too. Dragster is the only ride that causes problems regularly, but with that complexity, CP is trying their best.

The park still has the second trains, they just haven't put them on for some reason. Viper's are under the station ready to go (I actually saw them one visit) because both trains have been refurbished the last two years. RoS and Predators are in storage as well and should be in good condition. Motocoaster and Mind Erasers needed repairs and were removed but never repaired. So the major coasters still have them and are ready to go, it's just the call of managers (Chris Thorpe, Operations, and Maintenance) to put them on.

How often is Dragster down during daily summer operation? Does it get more consistent, or is it a guaranteed break down every day? Because my trip a few weeks ago, it was only open about for 25% of the time. Although it is a very complex system, you woild think that the park would want their star attraction to be open most of the time.

For right now, it doesn't matter to me who the park is sold to. I just want somebody who is willing to open up the wallet and invest in new attractions. As we all know, a major new roller coaster is needed, the park needs better upkeep, and there are still older attractions that need to be removed. Whether it's Premier or Herschend, I'm fine with both. Premier has impressed me this year, as they have added two new attractions that will be successful, as well as keeping up with maintenance. ME is getting a long needed paint-job during the operating season nonetheless. It sounds like management is leaning towards two train ops on major rides. The only thing long term that worries me is how much they will be able to open their wallets. I don't know how big their budget is, but if they can build big, they have my vote of confidence. I feel like to begin Herschend did a great job. They revitalized old, run down areas, and were adding new rides. However, towards the end of their term, they began to disappoint. Nothing new in 2014 and one train ops were the main ones. I know that Herschend has the money, it seems like they just pulled out of putting ideas through. I found a statement from a town meeting that said that Bob Montgomery wanted to plan something for last year: Whatever happened is unknown, but Herschend did have something big planned. Who knows, it may have even been a plan for an RMC Predator or new coaster on the Cuda Falls site. It sounds like the announcement of new ownership may be announced near the end of this year, but this quote was from a report that's 2 years old. The town sees DL as a vital money maker, and in the big picture, they want the park sold to someone who will invest and build major things. Herschend has the money, but it seems like Premier believes more in the park.

That news reporter really shouldn't have a job. Varney clearly is stating that the ride was definitely safe before the accident, but a unique set of circumstances lead to the accident. Plus, some new safety protocols will be added to ensure that an accident like this will not happen again. If people should get mad at anyone, it should be whomever was operating the ride, considering this of course was human error. There is no reason to have the ride in maintenance mode if people were aboard. Plus, the batwing and trains should have been monitored before moving anything.

Most coasters in general use sensors only around block areas (Near lifts, brakes, etc.). It is a rare occurrence for sensors to be used midway through a ride (cost is a big factor, and they aren't really necessary). There probably was not a sensor in that area, so the train wasn't detected. So unless maintenance overrode the error, there is a good chance that they overlooked the train and switched the train dial thinking an operator accidentally touched it. I don't think you understand how a block system works. A coaster is split up into block zones such as a lift, mcbr, launch, etc. Each block zone has a number of sensors that detect when a train is entering and exiting a block zone. For instance, on a MCBR there would typically be a sensor at the beginning and end of the brake run to know that the train is exiting the previous block and entering the next. The PLC will keep track of this up until the next block zone when it will flag another sensor and let the PLC know that the train has left that block zone and the next train is free to proceed. If that train doesn't flag the next sensor, the train behind it is told to stop at the next previous stopping point before the next block to ensure there is no collision. Just because there are no sensors in the batwing does not mean the PLC doesn't know where this train is. All the PLC needs to know is that a train has entered a certain zone and whether or not is has left yet. If the reports of the train stopped on the lift are true, that means the PLC did in fact know that the stalled train never left the block zone after the lift and was told to stop. Just about every roller coaster in existence follows this principle. Some more advanced rides like you would find at Disney/Universal utilize hundreds of these sensors to track ABSOLUTE position of every vehicle on the track. This is a more advanced (and costly) way of creating block zones. Also, from my experience I've seen some coaster control systems utilize a timer for block zones. Basically what happens is the designer will dictate how long they would typically expect a train to be within a certain block zone and add some sort of additional time on top. If a sensor isn't flagged within this amount of time after flagging the previous sensor, it would typically throw a fault in the system and bring the ride to a stop. This is the way a system knows whether or not a sensor is failed and is another safety measure put into place into ride systems. I think you might have misread his post because I think they understand that, they just were responding to grumpyfan by explaining that the sensors are normally only on things like mid-course brakes, lifts etc, that if a train valleys it won't keep rolling backwards and forwards through the same sensor because they're not normally installed randomly around the track on things like the batwing. There are of course exceptions like I think there is one on Rita just after the crest first hill so that the ride knows the train has successfully launched and cleared the first hill. Yeah, I know how block systems and PLCs work, I was just bringing up the point that sensors are usually located around blocks, not in random elements of the ride. However, maintenance mode can pretty much override anything, so even if the PLC had an idea of where the train was, a push of the reset button or alarm silence could have cleared it.

OMG. Please stop posting stuff like this people. We are supposed to all be smart enough in the theme park business to know this would be completely ridiculous. Outside of a couple of older coasters in Japan, can anyone point to a MAJOR NEW RIDE that had an issue that the park then up and got rid of because of it? No. So if in the totally off-chance something like that DID happen, it would be an industry first and a totally bizarre and shocking turn of events. Sorry, I'm not buying it. Orphan Rocker? Orphan Rocker was never officially opened though, and I believe that the track is still there. Ring Racer is the only major new one that I can think of, but that also has to do with the theme park's finances and other issues (edit and I don't think this ever officially opened either) These rumors always pop up when things go wrong. People said the same thing about TTD and Kingda Ka, but over 10 years later both coasters are still here. I wouldn't be too worried about it being closed.

I thought a few of them looked shinier than the rest my last visit. Do you know if the track is going to be painted too? Most people overlook paint. It has a lot more to do mechanically speaking than just cosmetics. The paint protects the steel from rust and corrosion, and helps the coaster last longer. RoS is faded too, but the paint hasn't started to peel yet like on ME, and the steel is at least protected.