darklingscribe

Thanks for the info. I picked Norfolk because my budget is already hurting and flying in to Norfolk is around $250 cheaper because I can use my Southwest points. Southwest unfortunately doesn't go to Richmond yet, and while Southwest does own Air Tran which flys to Richmond, I cannot use my points on Air Tran.

Are there any people from the west coast planning to attend? I'm seriously considering doing a four day weekend and maybe using the extra days to hit up some other parks on Thursday and Friday, or Monday and Tuesday. I really want to hit up Hersheypark and SFGA, probably will be driving between Norfolk airport (cheaper than Richmond) and Philadelphia.

^ Two center ones look attached, but I'm not sure how many cables they plan to put on. It looks like they have room for two more, but that could be just the decorative design of the top of the *catch car. * Is Catch car is the correct term for the apparatus that grips the top of the gondola and then drops it once it reaches the top of the tower?

It's great to see everyone having such a good time and Shock looks awesome. Maybe it's time to empty my change jar and hope I have enough for another trip.

Without the breakdown, how long do you think the wait would have been? I'm really thinking about going to the park at the end of June.

Went to Sea World again on Monday because I'm housesitting for some family that lives in San Diego. The house is only about 6 miles from Sea World so I used my daily workout as an excuse to visit the park and brought my bike to bike there. I rode Manta twice more and did a circuit of the ride to see if any progress has been made in landscaping the dirt mounds under the second half of the ride. So far it still looks like there is nothing there, but I'm not sure they haven't done something. I wish I brought my camera to take a picture, but since I didn't I'll have to try to explain it. There are three types of ground cover back there, the valleys between the mounds are covered in gravel and the dirt closest to the fencing is now covered in mulch with tiny plants placed at regular intervals. The tops of the mounds look like they have been covered with some sort of thin layer of something which looks suspiciously like the brown fibers packed in with the lawn patch filler you can get at a nursery. This has me wondering if Sea World has seeded the mounds.

^ Is making the announcement before LL's opening wise? I just get the feeling that if they do that and the new ride is going to be huge, then LL's opening might be reduced to a footnote in the media's coverage.

They could widen the space under superman next to gold rusher and have it return through that. Otherwise, worlds longest Shuttle coaster!

I threw in $20 now that I finally have some spare cash.

I was always under the impression that they were going to use the old monorail tunnel for this new coaster, so the mountain part isn't really going to get in the way. A ride that uses both the Log Jammer and Deja Vu areas might just be record breaking in it's length. I could see it being a coaster that is launched through the tunnel, out to the Deja vu area, where it goes though a spaghetti bowl type of element groupings and then returns to the Log jammer area with a series of bunny hops and perhaps finishing with a helix.

Well I had my first ride on Manta today, front and back, and was surprised to find quite a lot of airtime in it in both seats. The prelaunch video was working quite well and I didn't have any problem in seeing it before the launch doors opened. But the real reason why I'm posting in here is to congratulate the Sea World ride-ops. As you know the ride isn't super long, but they were running three trains with almost no stacking for as long as I was there. For someone used to SFMM this feat seemed miraculous to me.

Tranan is really fun and strange to ride. It is nearly impossible not to hold on as it feels very out of control. Great photo Hanno.

It looks wild. Did they say what the projected opening date for the ride will be?

If if gets really bad, they might have to devote a row solely to fastpass, or maybe alternate dispatches with one train full of fastpasses and the next regular park goers. As it is I'm surprised that Premiere couldn't do a ride system similar to what S&S did with Powder Keg's launch. That way they could have one train in loading and one on the ride, using a transfer track system to exchange the two.

I was simply thinking you could create the clear plastic support structure to go under the top hat and attach it there with the plastic ties to test the idea. That way you don't have to use glue to see if it works and the ties might be inconspicuous enough to not ruin the aesthetic you are going for. /edit Instead of heating plastic and bending it to shape (unless you are sure of your skill in that area), try a thin aluminum strip. You can find them at any large hardware store for $3 and they would probably be easier to bend to the shape you want.

^ Speaking of height for SFDK. I was wondering recently if the whole fairgrounds deal still stands? From what I remember years ago Vallejo offered to up the hight limit on the park if Six Flags would buy the fairgrounds across the street, though I could be misremembering this.

I don't think you need to glue it. I'd try something less permanent first. Maybe test out your idea first with yellow plastic ties:

There's people who don't count it as a coaster? It's an old debate. I do count it, but some people don't.

Steel: Top Thrill Dragster Wood: Son of Beast Shuttle: Superman: Escape from Krypton (that is if you count is as a coaster) Hmm. Just goes to show that height isn't everything, as none of these coasters are anywhere near my top 30.

I was wondering if they might be thinking of swapping flat rides between this park and Holiday World just to save money the first couple of years and still have "new" rides to advertise at both parks. To me it seems the wisest move if money is short.

Didn't they say at the West Coast Bash that the loop on Revolution has such high g-forces the the OTSRs are need to keep the riders upright in the safest position to go through the loop? I have serious doubts about this claim. Were there ever any cases of injury on Revolution before they installed the OTSRs?

Thanks. That one has been bugging me for a while.

I've always puzzled over how to build the Schwarzkopf curved shuttle loop in RCT like the Bullet that used to be at Flamingo Land. How would you approach this coaster?

Try to play the Leonard Maltin Game

That's really cool. I spent many an afternoon playing with K'nex as a kid, so to have my school do this would have been my idea of heaven back then. The entries look pretty good. I voted for Mythos just because you don't see that many racing/dueling k'nex coasters out there.