The Six Flags Magic Mountain (SFMM) Discussion Thread

[mr. cockblock]

Wow, reading this thread is getting depressing. Maybe its time to change the title of the thread to: The Six Flags Magic Mountain (SFMM) HATE Thread.

[Jew]

This thread has also featured plenty of praise for the park when it has been warranted. The way things are now don't deserve any praise.

[LaMapa]

There is a green piece that is connected to the track that raises and lowers in order to rotate the cars so that they remain upright in the station. When the ride begins ascending the lift hill, whatever is keeping the cars upright stops keeping them upright.. It's kinda hard to explain..

[B&MIntaminGCI]

There is a green piece that is connected to the track that raises and lowers in order to rotate the cars so that they remain upright in the station. When the ride begins ascending the lift hill, whatever is keeping the cars upright stops keeping them upright.. It's kinda hard to explain..

 

Sorta like the B&M Flyer mechanism that raises and lowers the trains into loading/flying position?

[LaMapa]

^yes, very similar to that.

[Sidra]

I'm not sure what SFMM is trying to do with limiting the spin on the coaster. I have a thought though, based on an experience we had there when we rode it. Last summer my brother, his girl and I rode it with a single rider put in next to me. My brother's side was pointing down as we left the station and we never got a spin as we went through, what we got was violently moved back and forth and as we got off the ride he could barely walk, almost fell down the stairs leaving and looked like he was going to pass out, had to sit for several minutes, wasn't right the rest of the day with a bad headache. I honestly think he had a minor concussion from it and he is never really affected by rides like that.

 

I haven't really seen anyone else reporting such a ride experience and I didn't enjoy the ride at all, but didn't experience what he did either, but maybe there have been a few others? Might be enough to make a California park really worry about liability.

[Tmcdllr]

So these Zac Spins...is there some kind of mechanism that realigns the 'pods' as it heads into the station? Much like what we've seen on spinning coasters where the car becomes realigned prior to heading into the station? What keeps these from rocking in the station? Perhaps I need to look at some nerd shots of a Zac Spin as it may answer some of my questions.

 

The 'correcting mechanism/lever' pushes down on rollers connected to the car chassis causing it to turn upright, it's basically the same type of mechanism that Pandemonium used except it is on the track above the cars- it pretty much does the same thing. After that, there is a sort of 'fixed' track or guide these rollers follow which locks the cars in the upright position and prevents them from spinning in the station, this guide in through the entire station area. Once a car starts up the lift, as it leaves the station the guide ends and since the rollers are not forced against anything the car is then free to spin.

 

Here you can see where the flat 'anti-spin' guide track ends at the bottom of the lift- if you look at the the wheels on the car then right above them you will see the flat guide track

 

here is a closeup shot of it, the section to the right is where it ends just after the slightly bent part

 

Was also going back through old posts and found this from when the ride opened...

 

 

^^That brings me to another question lol In that LA Times article it says SFMM was going to do something to the trains to make them spin more? What are they going to do and why didn't they already do it, to have the trains spinning at there max upon opening?

 

I'm guessing they're going play with the weight distribution until they find one where most cars will get minimum 2 spins. It will still vary based on who you ride with, and that's not always something you can control, especially on busy days. Thank God for WCB.

[Gav]

So these Zac Spins...is there some kind of mechanism that realigns the 'pods' as it heads into the station? Much like what we've seen on spinning coasters where the car becomes realigned prior to heading into the station? What keeps these from rocking in the station? Perhaps I need to look at some nerd shots of a Zac Spin as it may answer some of my questions.

http://rcdb.com/3613.htm?p=20263

Ok, so on the car itself look at the yellow triangle beside the right hand seats with two little wheels on the corners. Those wheels run against a rail in the station, forcing the triangle to stay level and therefore the car.

 

http://rcdb.com/3613.htm?p=26387

Look at the station track, and you can see an orange rail (An I beam) that bends upwards and ends suddenly...This is the rail that is keeping that "triangle with wheels" level. Once it gets past the end of the rail the car is free to flip.

 

http://rcdb.com/3676.htm?p=20078

Here is what happens when you get back to the station. You can see the rail 'curving" downwards to horizontal. This "guides" the triangle with wheels underneath the rail. Additionally, you can see a row of motors above it, and short little lever type arms that connect the rail to the motors. These allow the entire rail piece to move up and down, so it can push down on the triangle with wheels and force it to be level.

 

Now, issues happen if a car comes in at 90 degrees. That rail that moves up and down can make the car the turn the other way...Instead of going level, it makes it go upside down even more.

The system detects if it has done this, and the arm retracts quickly straight away, and then tries to push down again...It can take several attempts to level the car, wasting time and capacity.

 

If someone can confirm, But in general with these rides, from how I understand it and from videos of the ride I have seen I thought it was policy there that the cars be evenly loaded, manufacturers instruction eg:

 

http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=46996&start=110#wrap

On Kirnu they wouldnt dispatch with any empty seats. There was a short line for it all day (well, before it broke down) so there werent any problems filling the seats, but it meant that quite alot of people had to ride with a stranger. No one seemed to mind though.

 

 

Weight is very dependant, No Single Riders on these rides, I had to wait in an almost Empty Terra Mitica for another single rider to appear so I could enjoy Inferno, and what a ride!!!

 

I have to say, the first drop when you suddenly reverse position if you are facing away from the ride certainly gives you a shock, and that last hill is great fun.....not a particularily scary ride, but so much fun, you just cannot help but laugh all the way round!

 

 

Please build more of these, great fun!

 

Andrew

 

.....

 

the reason I was given from the ride op's was that it is a balance thing.

 

If you are in a pair, you cannot ride next to each other, you ride back to back from each other, thus if you are on your own, you need someone else to sit back to back with you to balance the car.

 

Anyone got anymore information on this?

 

Andrew

 

I know TPR got a really good ERT session at Grona Lund, but that's not how they normally run it right? The park probably wouldn't care about cars flipping too much and having the leveling issue coming into the station if it was ERT, but I don't think they would put up with it in day to day operations.....See http://www.lifthill.net/berichte/insane_eng.php

 

Curious, we take place in one of the eight-seated waggons, four persons on each side beside of the track, sitting back-to-back. The ride-operators are watching carefully the loading balance of the free hanging gondola, as the weight distribution is responsible for more or less swinging and rollover during the ride. A single-side loading balance will not get the staffs clearance, this would lead to extreme tours with continuous spinning, which the park is not willing and able to expect from the visitors.

 

Guest complaints/injuries would be the other aspect too IMO, since a cycle with a lot of flips exposes you to some pretty crazy forces..The blood noses and vomiting that happened at the Grona Lund session perhaps embodying that!

 

So, my guess with SFMM is perhaps the ops weren't running it properly, and its more a case of SFMM actually moving in line with the way they should be doing it for safety and operational reasons. I don't think flips during the main ride itself are a problem, its more when cars come off the final 'turn' and do that thing where they flip a couple of extra times in the station and stop sideways, and then that leads to the system not leveling them properly and so on.

[daveydo5172]

Here is what Screamscape has to say on the matter:

 

Park News - (5/15/12) I’ve received a couple of e-mails from locals with connections regarding that “No Inversions” sign posted for the crew at Green Lantern. From how it has been explained, the “No Inversions” warning isn’t about the overall ride experience, but is apparently a term used to describe when a very unbalanced car returns to the station and is so out of whack, it cannot right itself. When this happens, the ride shuts down and maintenance is called out to manually adjust the car and restart the ride, a process which takes about 15 minutes or so. So while the warning is a good one that makes sense, perhaps a better term could be used.

[AnonymousReed]

Oh yeah..the park is selling $30 flash drives so you can get unlimited on ride photos. I'm off topic but felt worth mentioning.

[susie zueck]

^ Finally and does GL still have an enormous line now that they tamed it down?

[LaMapa]

^It was to the entrance (1 hour) on Saturday. Yesterday you could walk right inside the building (10 minutes). So kinda, but it has gone down a bit.

[SharkTums]

I don't even really believe that explanation about the sign only meaning when the car comes back to the station upside down or 'not balanced'. First off, if they're trying to avoid that, they still need to try and make it not flip during the course which means the same thing!!!! Secondly, we witnessed tons of crazy off balanced re-entries into the station at Grona Lund and all it took were the ops going over and righting the car. Someone of course had to be paying attention as the car could not advance until it was righted, but this was simply done with proper staffing levels.

[ginzo]

^Yeah, it didn't take 15 minutes and a call to maintenance to get the cars back into the loading area at Grona Lund. I rode Insane for the ENTIRE ERT session and came back into the station nearly upside down several times. It wasn't a big deal.

[SoCalCoasters]

I don't understand how they can't just give the ride ops some kind of basic mechanic training that would allow them to be able to go over to the car and right it instead of just having to wait ten minutes while they call a mechanic to come and right it.

 

Getting stuck on it during West Coast Bash was infuriating. We sat down and the car moved forward an inch before stopping since a car had stalled inverted. After waiting twenty minutes for the mechanic to come and fix it, we did a circuit, then right as we were about to enter the load/unload zone the car stopped AGAIN due to a stall. After ANOTHER twenty minutes our car was finally able to unload and I was extremely sore from having to sit for forty minutes in those trains...

 

After that I gave up on the ride...it wasn't worth wasting any more of my time...

[Sir Clinksalot]

I'm sure some stupid CA Law/SF Policy (not to mention having teenagers running the rides) is what's preventing the ops from rotating the cars.

[DJeXeL]

^^It's probably more so SF policy. Stupid policy.....but a policy nonetheless.

Edited May 15, 2012 by DJeXeL

[robbalvey]

I don't understand how they can't just give the ride ops some kind of basic mechanic training that would allow them to be able to go over to the car and right it

There isn't any mechanic training needed! At Grona Lund, the ops would just come over and turn the car like it was a steering wheel. It's made to rotate. The ops at Linnanmaki were doing the same thing. I even rotated the car myself a bit when I was mounting the camera. The idea that this cannot be done by a ride op, and requires a maintenance person makes no sense to me!

 

--Robb "The ride should have never been built in America." Alvey

Edited May 15, 2012 by robbalvey

[robbalvey]

Wow, reading this thread is getting depressing. Maybe its time to change the title of the thread to: The Six Flags Magic Mountain (SFMM) HATE Thread.

 

This thread has also featured plenty of praise for the park when it has been warranted.

Remember these days?

 

http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=545442#p545442

 

http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=549756#549756

 

http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=708321#708321

[DJeXeL]

^Yes and I miss those days.......

[LoneRider92]

Aww man, I was hoping that Green Lantern would turn out awesome so that they might start appearing in other parks (one preferably nearby to me). However, with Magic Mountain having so much trouble running this one, I see that possibility growing less and less likely. So disappointing, ZacSpins look like such unique and wild rides.

 

Holding out hope though.

[SharkTums]

^Join us on our next TPR Scandinavia Trip! Then you'll get to ride the best one out there!

[Nrthwnd]

^ What she said, lol.

 

And here's a pic of INSANE,

to prove it.

Lovely, scary, freeky, intense. We even got the T-SHIRT, lol!

[fpsphil]

First time i got a ride on GL i went with my friend who was on the heavy side of things and had a wild ride flipped about 4 times. But ever since then its been always balanced rides which absolutely kills the ride experience. I guess the only way to have a wild ride is to take a friend whose on the heavier side of things with you to the park.

[XYZ]

Why does Green Lantern have those "arm guards" when Insane (Grona Lund) doesn't have it?