LuminousAphid

I've been on both of these coasters now at least twice, plus one other Arrow, and this is how I'd rate them: Arrow- Silverwood: Great little coaster, I love the front but the back does give you a bit of air. My family complained of massive headbanging during Scarywood? So I suppose it's all relative, but I say 7/10 considering its age and heritage Vekoma- Playland: Fantastic! There are multiple little pops of air that are super fun and the ride is glassy smooth compared to an Arrow IMO. I was listening to it the second time I rode it and it's eerily quiet in the slower sections. Very fun 8/10 Arrow- Wild Waves & Enchanted Village: Just awful, I don't know how the same company made this almost 10 years LATER than Silverwood's, added a loop, and managed to mangle it this badly. Maybe it's just aged badly, but that thing hurts, 4/10 Vekoma wins by far from what I have ridden, that thing is awesome!! VEKOMA

^^ Really glad I made it up to see you & experience Playland, I'll post a couple of pics here & I might do a short TR too or I might not. I haven't really looked closely at the pics I got yet, but I think getting stopped at the border and issues with payment might make for a good story. My bank flagged trying to buy the gate ticket as fraud, by the way; I guess I should have called them before going to a foreign land , so thanks again! The beautiful Kettle Creek Mine Coaster Oh god the selfies... I <3 Wave Swinger Vekoma Corkscrew: the better Arrow Corkscrew Loved it!

Hey, I am looking forward to riding that actually! It will be fun to compare to our Arrow corkscrew down here, although ours has a loop and it redeemed itself a bit this year since I only rode in the front. But an El Loco would be super awesome, they have been doing some cool things with those lately. Those Premier Rides triple launch loopy things look fun too and maybe cheaper, but I wish they could make one with a more interesting layout

Since I randomly had Saturday off, I decided to head down to Wild Waves & Enchanted Village to check out the park this year. It's my local park, and there are some changes happening this year that I wanted to check out- they're installing a S&S Double Shot and an Enterprise, plus officially "splitting" into 2 parks so that guests can pay less $$ rides only, or more $$ for both rides & slides. I don't know if there will be an option for only the water park for less $$. I think it's a good idea since if it's a colder day and not good for water slides, they might still get some guests on the rides side. Such was the case on Saturday, but since they haven't implemented the 2 separate parks yet, I decided to bring my suit and actually got to try all of the slides I haven't been on. i was able to get on all of them plus my old favorite the "River Rapids" ride, so it turned out to be a more fun day than I thought it might be considering the weather. It definitely kept the crowds away, and everything was a walk-on all day except if you wanted a front seat on one of the coasters. I headed down a little later in the morning and arrived around lunch time, and this was the first hopeful sign that my hunch about low crowds would be right on A good sign as far as crowds go The parking lot was nearly as empty as when I was there during Christmastime, and that made me smile. The one thing I hate about this place is going in the summer when lines are ridiculous. I headed toward the rides since it was still very cold at 11:00, and The Wild Thing immediately broke down (or one of the people didn't know how to operate it, I don't know) while I waited to get on the first ride of the day. Oh joy. The Wild Thing Corkscrew Off to Timberhawk, for a couple of fun rides in the back Timberhawk: Ride of Prey I waited a cycle for the paratrooper before the op told me there were no single riders, which I still don't understand on the majority of rides this rule is in place for. This model is cool because it has a hydraulic lifting arm, so all the cars can be loaded at once instead of needing to rotate the whole ride for each load The Patatrooper Needs a cleaning Then I went to have a look around at some of the scenery, and I was pleasantly surprised by some of the stuff they have going on. A lot of it looks really good, and while other spots need some work it's overall a really nice place to walk around in. I didn't really see any glaring ugly spots except the construction sites and the "Downhill Tubin'" area looked pretty beat up Lots of hanging baskets Leftovers from Halloween? To the right is where the Double Shot and Enterprise will be Very nice bathrooms overall The Candy Factory was sort of disappointing, but they had some caramel apples with Oreo pieces stuck to it Silly fountain Overview of the bigger slide towers I went on the Timber Axe which made me a little queasy, so I decided to take a break, get some lunch and try some of the water slides! Looks harmless Not so harmless on my stomach I will continue this later, it's memorial day and I don't want to spend all day writing about this instead of enjoying the (now nice) weather!

So I found where the 2 new rides will be going; the Enterprise will be going next to the lake, I believe where the scrambler was previously, and the drop tower is going just up the hill from that where the Falling Star was before it catastrophically failed. Here's pics of that while I make a full photo TR This is where the Scrabler used to be, and where the Enterprise is supposed to be going Here's the Scrambler in pieces And just above it is where the drop tower will go- although at this point it looks like lots of work left Looks like it will be later in the season that we see the new rides, maybe much later... Oh well, I don't really plan on going back until October when I try once again to make it to Fright Fest on a day with decent weather, so hopefully they will be in and running by then

I'll be heading down tomorrow to check out the park this year and see if I can see any construction of the new rides; they have been keeping quiet even when they replied to me on facebook stating that "details are pending" so we'll see if anything has materialized yet. I believe one of the posts said either "coming in June" or "July" so there has to be at least some construction started I'd think, especially for the double shot I know it's short notice but if anyone wants to meet up PM me or reply!

Just saw today that we have new brochures for SW at work--I work at a hotel all the way in Seattle, but we still get them each year and I try to tell people about it if I can! Here are scans, I tried to get them higher res but our copier is a POS Just for kicks I might scan and upload last year's to see which is better- I think this years looks great! Good job to their graphic designer

Maybe they're sending it down to us; Wild Waves is getting an Enterprise and a Double Shot this summer, so you can always drive 3 hours to ride one here! I love how there's an inconvenient huge bush in the middle of the entrance for that pizza place. I hope I can make it up there in one of the next few weekends!

I just had a thought; has anyone ever made an "outside corkscrew"? Think a corkscrew shape but instead of spinning around the inside, the train is riding along the outside of the shape? I just realized that's stupid; I don't think people can handle those kind of sustained negative G's without passing out

I just realized that Enchanted Forest near Portland has what looks like an awesome log flume- can anyone confirm?

Hey everyone, here is the setup for this thread; I was just watching a Matterhorn Bobsleds POV because why not, and noticed that the brakes at the very beginning seem to be pretty aggressive, causing some people to jerk forward against the restraints when they stop. It immediately made me think, does that wear the brakes out faster? How about the restraints? Then I began to realize there is a whole gamut of things parks can do right or wrong when it comes to how they run their rides, and it might make for an interesting discussion among nerds. I suppose it's sort of like driving your car- you can treat it gingerly and help keep it looking and running well for a long time, or you can run use it to its full potential and pay for it down the road. Now obviously preventative maintenance and quality of repair/upkeep can make a difference, but I'm talking specifically about normal operations; things parks can do just by operating the ride a certain way to cut costs, have less downtime, increase reliability, etc. In the case I mentioned, I'm actually wondering if Disney stops the cars so hard to shave off a few milliseconds from each cycle, or does that help the brakes last longer? Or is it unrelated and it's just how the ride operates? One example I can give you is the old Arrow loop & screw our local park has. They let the train roll almost out of the station with no brakes, but then stop the last cars on the forward station brakes so it slows way down as it curves around to the lift. I'm pretty sure it's meant to prevent strain on the lift chain or motor, because I can see no other reason to stop the car completely every time it leaves the station, but wouldn't that also put extra wear on that front station brake? Oddly enough, they then put 2x the wear on the coaster because each ride includes 2 laps, just like those kiddie coasters!

It's weird that this is the case, and it seems like they must have changed the design in part of the wheel assembly/undercarriage at some point, but does anyone know exactly what is making the noise? Loosely fitted bearings? I'm sure the company has figured it out but has anyone heard what the actual cause is?

Keep in mind I have yet to ride any B&M (I know I know I'm going to this summer), but I feel that this juxtaposition is why this thread exists: the rides have a reputation for being smooth, but somewhere along the line have developed this issue which seems to ruin that smoothness for some people. It's an interesting issue and I can see why it irks some people; it's like when you're in the car and something suddenly starts rattling, and now you can't concentrate on anything except that and how to get it to stop. I can see why this would be annoying on a coaster that you're trying to enjoy.

That. Looks. AWESOME I am so jealous, I want to ride one of those so badly

It's a pretty good one too, I think they'd fixed it up somewhat since last year, it seemed to be running pretty well. Last year it was horribly noisy and kept making alarmingly loud clacking noises whenever they reversed the drive to load/unload, but maybe that was just because I spent more time near to it--it was right next to the coaster queue that time! I will have to ride it this fall if I make it back

Well that only halfway counts, because you worked there right? I drive ~15k to and from work per year right now, with traffic usually costing me 2 hours every day in the car! I wasn't complaining about the drive, since it's a much nicer one than my normal commute; I just never realized it was that far. Eastern Washington goes by so fast because there's nothing there edit; hey I got a new donkey title!

Are we watching the same POV? I just went back to watch it, and it looks great to me! Some of those little bunny hills look super intense to me. Just because it's not the most intense, mind-blowing coaster ever built doesn't mean it can't be a whole lot of fun. I think some of you concentrate too much on the intensity race and forget that rides are meant to be fun!

I finally got to ride Wild Cat at the Puyallup Fairgrounds last weekend, and it was a surprisingly good time! It's the first Schwarzkopf I have ever ridden, and although it seems almost like a kiddie ride from the looks of it, it was really intense at points. The drops are actually really fun despite being mostly straight ramp-shaped sections- you gain speed really quickly when you're suddenly pitched 30 degrees forward! The helixes at the end are very good too; they banked the track pretty heavily but you still get some great lateral forces which made the fact I was riding with a stranger a bit awkward 9/10 would ride again Car heading into the second-to-last helix

Once I realized I was filming unloading and loading of the trains, I was a bit ashamed

That's insane! That looks like quite a coaster, thanks for the picture!

Wow, reading some of the replies makes me realize we're not as bad off as we could be here in the NW. The closest are Timberhawk & Wild Thing at Enchanted Village/Wild Waves about an hour (45 miles) from me. Technically Klondike Gold Rusher counts too, but that thing sucks. The WA State Fairgrounds in Puyallup is next with Classic Coaster, Rainier Rush and Wild Cat about 1hr 20mins away. I have been on all of these now. We used to have Windstorm at the Seattle Center Fun Forest about 20 miles away, luckily I got to ride it a couple times before it went away I always thought Vancouver BC was pretty far away, but it's actually closer (130 miles) than Portland (190 miles), but might take longer if the border is really backed up; Playland has Coaster and Corkscrew, then there's Looping Thunder at Oaks Park in Portland- I'm not sure I would call this a "real" coaster though, but it goes upside-down so? I haven't been to either of these 2 parks yet, but I really want to get up to Playland this year! Funny thing is, I just searched for "roller coaster" on google maps and it took me right to Silverwood, even though it's 350 miles from me! I have driven there though (twice!) and it's got the best coaster lineup in the NW though, so I agree with google on this one edit; wow I just realized I drove over 1,400 miles to and from Silverwood last year

Thank you sir! I believe it is the very one, according to any source I could find. They repainted it from white to orange when it went to the LA County fairgrounds, and now we have it as a double-hand-me-down. I can't believe people ride it I also just found this regarding that coaster; it seems we all avoided permanent physical injury from this beast http://prev.dailyherald.com/story/?id=339548 Enjoy some unedited video I took, just in case it will convince someone we should meet up in the fall to hit up the fair! Here is each train on Classic Coaster doing a couple of laps when I arrived around lunchtime "Ghost Pirates" is really very bad, I experienced it during the fair last year and it was not worth $4.50 You want janky slingshots? We got janky slingshots LOUD HORN WARNING This was my view from the beer garden, it was a nice place to be for a person who likes rides I could also watch the drop tower from there Listen to how funny the anti rollback sounds... I don't know what makes that noise, can anyone enlighten me? It's charming There are some pictures of the remodel and a fire that happened a long time ago, it has been rebuilt several times One of the vendors actually had some amazingly beautiful plants for sale, I wish I had the money and the yard for that More coastering https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIyC5M9p_vc This was actually pretty great, sometimes fake screaming is annoying but everyone was actually laughing at this girl's crazy freak out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlhesFau1E0 Some night action on Classic Coaster is always fun, that lift hill kills me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1B8enM06WVg And I will leave you with everyone's favorite "white trash carnival ride": The Zipper is a low-capacity ride, so I wasn't surprised when all day there was somewhat of a line for it, especially since it was running a decently long cycle- enough to make me question whether I wanted to ride it. When I finally got the courage to try I found it had a huge line, I kept walking and walking and eventually about 3 rides down the midway I asked someone, "Are you waiting for the Zipper?!" "Yep." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaKlxh1H25M

As long as the car passes the 135 degree angle then it is an inversion. I really don't get how this can be so confusing. It's not confusion now that you've cleared it up, I just disagree with your definition. Who decided that was the magic number?

Part 3: I'm tired Alright, I'm sick of being long winded about this, you get the impression anyway. I'm just going to dump the rest of these pics here, enjoy! It was an awesome day This is beginning to stress my limited amateur post production skills This little wheel had some nice LEDs Oh god not again 'merica wheel I asked what this button was, and I was told it's not a button, it is "a bolt" Hope you enjoyed, if anyone wants videos of anything let me know, I took some but I'm too lazy to do anything with them ATM

Oh wow there was a commercial featuring it? That's just wrong! I knew it came from Santa's Village but I didn't know it was a main attraction at some point... I'm sorry to those who went there just to get a ride on this. I did not ride it this time because I remembered the person behind me screaming, "OW MY HEAD!" the first time I rode it last September