texcoaster

I personally HATE the "NTAG" moniker. Maybe we can use "New Giant" until it rolls off the tongue like "Nugent"

I tend to have different criteria for what I love in a coaster, so my favorites are rarely lined up with those that end up at the top Mitch's poll, or the ones that will Golden Tickets. Voyage, SFNE's Superman/Bizarro, and EGF are notable exceptions to the above rule, but there are plenty of coasters on my all-time faves list that make other enthusiast friends of mine say "wait... what?" In the wood category, Mega Zeph just blew me away (insert bad hurricane pun here). It had everything I want in a wood coaster, just enough roughness, violent ejector airtime, killer laterals in the final helix, and the best 2nd drop of all time (followed immediately by the most OMFG curving bunny hill ever). Why none of my friends ever exited this ride with more than an "it's OK, I guess" is beyond me. As for steel, I freaking love Lightwater Valley's "The Ultimate". Love, love, love. It's such a mind trip, the gentle trip out in the ungodly-long train, swooshing through the meadowlands. The string of caterpillar-like bunny hills leading to the second lift. The yards and yards of track that just sit on the ground and do pretty much nothing. The sheep grazing in the meadows surrounding the ride. The second lift hill that takes about 20 minutes to get to the top, and the insanely slow turn at the top of it with the odd fence covered in underwear. All of this nonsense and cheekiness is forgotten when that long train finally leaves the lift and drops into the woods for the trip home. My god, what a brutal, insane, poorly-designed, improperly-banked maelstrom of unpredictability that is! There is just nothing right about it and yet that's what I love most.

My first ride on NTAG. Seriously. Thought it was "fun" but pretty tame. Then I rode the back seat and OMFG. By the time I got in a bunch of rides in the back, it had warmed up and was giving great rides all over the train. It's now my #1 steelie, so it just goes to show that every coaster gives an "off" ride once in awhile.

New Texas Giant.

It was more noticeable this past weekend, on the turn leading out of the station to the lift hill. Once the trains hit the top of the lift, the bumping was about the same as on media day.

Awwwww, dammit. The Houston Art Car Parade is the same day. Already booked for TPRTGB! but sorry I'll miss the ACP this year. It's a Houston institution!

True - but what you compare it to? For example, Carowind's claims that Intimidator cost them $23 Million, CP says that Maverick cost $21 million, and apparently Diamondback cost Kings Island $22 million. Is the overall quality and marketability of NTAG comparable to any of those rides? If it IS, then SFOT got a steal for $10 million! --Robb Not only that, but on a backstage tour of the old Giant a few years back, we were told that SFOT spent $250,000 or more PER YEAR to keep Giant open. Not "in good shape", not "awesome", not even "rideable". Just "open." Extensive trackwork every off-season, all kinds of maintenance on the trains after parts get shaken loose, etc etc etc.... And for what? So guests could get off the ride and tell all their friends how horrible it was. The upside of the renovation is that not only are guests lining up in droves at the front gates to try this thing out, not only are those same guests telling their friends that it's the best coaster in the park, but the maintenance costs per year should go down drastically. Increased guest satisfaction and attendance, decreased costs. Not to mention that it frees up a bunch of hours for the maintenance crew to do upkeep on other rides. So yeah, a bit of an expenditure up front, but I'm guessing that SFOT is going to recoup that $10mil in a couple of years or less. For the first time in many years, SFOT is finding itself on the "must-do" list for coaster lovers and industry folks worldwide.

Another vote for New Texas Giant. Airtime on almost every hill and extreme air in at least three places. By extreme, I mean OMFG.

The trains on New Texas Giant have to be mentioned here. Extremely comfy and they look great on the track. For oddness, though, that 40-car train on Opryland's Chaos was amazing.

In many areas, the lots around sporting arenas and concert venues are owned by different companies. They don't make their money any other way. Your parking fee pays for their business, employees, taxes, etc. Most theme parks own their lots. They make money off the tickets, the food, the drinks, the souvenirs, etc. so it might feel a bit more like gouging when you're already paying $50 to get into the park and then they want $15 more just to park. Not exactly apples and apples on the concert/sporting event comparison in many cases.

NTAG cost $10mil, but you're also paying for a learning curve there. The more of these get done, the less they should cost per foot of track. Also, if RMC significantly altered Mean Streak's layout, it could easily be a show-stopper the way that NTAG is now. Don't kid yourself, just because NTAG's layout roughly follows the same footprint as the original, it's not at all the same... and barely even similar. Flying carpet? It's gone. Very little of what made that section special is left, but it's been replaced by airtime and tunnels. Still great, but in a much different way than before. Mean Streak could get a taller, steeper drop and a ton of overbanks and it could be great. And Rob, I disagree with you on SOB. The fact that it sucked in its original form is even MORE of a reason to redo it with Iron Horse. Give it a wicked, twisting, 90degree banked turn into the first drop instead of that nellie swoop at the top of the lift. Lower the top of that first big helix and enter/exit it with overbanked turns. Put the loop back in. Toss in some ridiculous, thigh-bruising airtime in the back half. It can be done and RMC are apparently the sort of folks who could do it.

Carmel Apples and Carmel Corn? Was this a religious themed carnival, or can they just not spell "Caramel"?

I must agree. I'd hate to see every rough woodie be an automatic candidate for this treatment and I'm actually looking more forward to the first "from scratch" Iron Horse coaster than I am to seeing another retrofit. A wood coaster can remain a great ride for many years IF it gets the TLC it needs. Giant Dipper (either one) is a good example of an old woodie still giving a classic ride. However, some coasters (like Giant) have simply gotten to the point where they are practically unfixable and even if the money is spent to get it back into shape, the maintenance costs would likely render the thing unridable again in a few years anyway. These coasters are great candidates for a makeover and I'm glad to see the option is available. Like you said, when the options are Iron Horse, leave it in the current unridable state, or tear it down.... Iron Horse is the preferable choice.

Beautiful day at the park today. Giant was running well, as was Titan. Got three rides on Giant, longest wait was about 20 min, then the queue began to back up past the bottom of the first drop. Boyfriend says it's his new #1 coaster. "Uncle Steve" was on the exit ramp with some VIPs and a camera guy. He recognized me from media day and made it a point to say "hello." Titan was running well with two trains. It seems much tamer than it used to after stepping off the Giant just before it. Shockwave was running as was Judge Roy Scream. That ride needs some serious help. There was new track on the turn before the lift, but not where it needed it. The bottom of every drop was bone-shatteringly brutal and each one became a test of endurance. It's possible that the front of the train was better, but after the one back seat ride, we were DONE with this coaster. It was literally a walk-on all day with half-filled trains and for good reason.

I suppose there's a grain of truth to that. It's quite smooth and is mostly wood, except the tracks. How about "smoothest steel/wood hybrid" or "among the world's smoothest rides!" Here's the thing: SFOT needed some kind of superlative to market their ride, since most of the GP assumed that they were just retracking it. Even those who noticed the new track was different often needed some convincing that this was a new ride and not just the old one fixed. One way to garner that kind of attention is to attach the attention-grabbing adjectives to it, like "steepest" and "smoothest". How to do that, though, when it's not the anything-est in the world? Well, you modify the claim with limits, and since the GP (and the lemming reporters who regurgitated all the info SFOT gave them on media day) doesn't know any better, you say "steepest wood coaster", "most banking on a wood coaster", and "smoothest wood coaster." It's not much different than when a park advertises "fastest coaster in the southeast" or "tallest coaster in a state with a two-word name" or "steepest drop of any coaster with green track." The one difference here is that they left out the word "structured" -- as in "steepest wood STRUCTURED coaster". Aside from forums such as this, most folks won't even question it.

Kinda hard to get a good look on the youtube vid... here's a better pic of Uncle Steve, from the media day preview. Obviously very happy with the reactions NTAG is getting!

If you were riding it at the same time I was sunday in the evening...that wasn't just a supervisor...that was the park president, Martindale himself. He was greeting people and asking how they enjoyed it and talking with ride attendants. "Uncle Steve" is well-known for getting out and about in the park and surveying how guests are reacting to things and getting a feel for what's popular and what's not. He's friendly and easy to talk to, he has a long history with the park (worked there as a teen and even met his wife there), and seems to genuinely care that visitors have a good time. He's also ridiculously handsome, but that's a whole 'nother thread.

I loves me some EGF. It was my favorite coaster overall for about a year, then Voyage took the #1 spot. It remained my favorite steel coaster of all time until Thursday when New Texas Giant took that spot. I thought it would forever have the "best first drop ever" title, but NTAG took that honor, too. It's an incredible, fun, airtime-filled joyfest with a seriously wicked first drop. I need to go back there.

No, because it would then be a steel coaster.

I was annoyed by all of the news outlets regurgitating "steepest drop on a wooden coaster" because it was fed to them by SFOT and they didn't bother to fact-check. Worse were the people who said "steepest drop of any coaster"... but this here is just epic fail.

There is one, but it's the same page as the old Giant. The stats haven't been updated, though, as it still lists the previous height, speed, etc and it also says the trains have headrests. However, it lists the coaster as steel and mentions that it's a hybrid with an explanation at the bottom of the page. I emailed Duane a few days ago, letting him know that the name has officially changed to "New Texas Giant" and that the ride now has a different serial number, and that it should have its own page, separate from the now-gone Giant. He emailed back saying that he disagrees that it's a new coaster and the current page will remain. I'm betting that once he actually rides it, he won't think so!

^ You just answered the question I was going to ask about whether you guys would do a from-scratch design as well as retrofits - psychic much? But since you answered that part of the question, here's the second part: on a brand-new coaster, would/could RMC do a complete turn-key project (survey, design, construction, etc) or would you just be the construction portion of the project, leaving the layout design, theming, etc to other groups? I think I read somewhere that Alan Shilke of Ride Centerline LLC designed the layout of NTG. Also, I've noticed that topper track seems to be implemented (so far) by parks on just the roughest parts of their woodies. How does it ride compared to the wood track? Is there a noticeable difference when the train goes from wood to topper and back?

GG.... Actually, I think you'd be interested to know that in a typical wooden coaster it takes 3 ft of rise to 100 ft of run with regards to the track for the effects of gravity to make the train move involuntary. Our newly designed flat steel track accomplishes the same movement with only 6 inches of rise to the same 100 ft of run. Hence the drag is significantly reduced in this new system. I believe what you may have felt is extra grease in the bearings. Contrary to some peoples hopes or wishes.... Lol... grease to slow things down is a good thing! Coasters are designed to run within certain specifications as so not to hurt anyone. If this ride, as probably others were allowed to run unrestricted.... well.. we may have seen Robb in his video get completely ejected and land in the theater next door. T So it wasn't my imagination that the ride got a bit faster as the day went on and warmed up a bit... the first ride of the day (around 5am) seemed really sluggish and many of the hills didn't have much airtime to speak of. It hadn't cycled much before we rode and it was COLD! We were supposed to smile for the camera, but I was frozen by the time we got to the midcourse and the best smile I could manage probably looked like one of those botox models with lockjaw.

It's almost as hard to see in the screenshot as it is flying by on the ride! That reach envelope pic is cool. Even though the angle of the camera makes it appear really close, the fact of the matter is that it is REALLY CLOSE. Not close enough to touch for real, but close enough to make you damn glad those windows are on the train! And speaking of clearances, how about that last overhead support in the 115deg turn that has a bite taken out of it to make clearance!

NTAG= New Tex-Ass Giant