The Six Flags Magic Mountain (SFMM) Discussion Thread

[singemfrc]

^ X2's line is usually pretty short at that time relatively speaking but the park has been pretty busy overall lately. You want to ride on the inside with someone heavier on the outside.

 

If you ride on the outside with no one on the inside, then you're gonna have a bad time.

 

If you're going by yourself remember the single rider lines on Viper/Revolution/Riddler/GLFF/LLDD

[DJeXeL]

^^Stay away from the back, It will beat the sh*t out of you.

That's my only advice for X2. Other than that, fantastic ride as it always has been.

I personally like the outside seat, 1st row, on the "stair-side" of the station.

[mykolbeta]

I went to the park yesterday, here's how it went down:

 

Started counterclockwise so we went to Yolocoaster first, I hadn't been on it yet. It was in fact running only 1 train, but surprisingly the 1 hour and 20 minute wait didn't feel all that long. The loop is cool, but my favorite part is actually from the tunnel reverse launch on towards the end. Definitely one I would re-ride a few times if the line were smaller.

 

Goliath was a 20 minute wait, line was out only to about half of the stairs. 2 trains were running, efficient dispatching.

 

Lex Luthor had a half-filled queue building, wait was around 40 minutes, normal dispatching.

 

Colossus was a walk-on, Scream a 20 minute wait. Colossus was surprisingly rough yesterday...well, in comparison to how it felt back in April. Either way that coaster is always fun for me...hopefully I can make it back in October for the reverse trains. Scream was only running 1 train...so if it had 2, I'm sure that 20 minute wait would turn into a walk-on to 5 minute wait at the most. Scream is usually neglected by most (that parking lot coaster effect yo').

 

Batman was a 15 minute wait, Green Lantern closer to 40 minutes. Green Lantern actually didn't rough me up like it usually does, we still got one definite flip and a bunch of 3/4's of the way into a flip throughout the ride.

 

Skipped Riddler's and Superman.

 

Apocalypse was closed! which was lame since I really like that ride, its short and sweet like Batman. If I remember correctly, when I went back in April, that ride was a walk-on, and I think we re-rode it after coming back into the station since no one was in line for our seats.

 

Tatsu was about an hour wait time. 2 trains were running, the dispatching was okay. I've seen them dispatch faster before, but I did notice a woman in her late 20's or early 30's wearing casual clothes and a name tage in the dispatching crew areas, jotting things down on a clipboard with each dispatch. She was jovial with the crew though, so I don't know if she was actually supervising the Ops or what.

 

My group wanted to go straight to X2 despite Viper probably being a walk on (the last few times I've gone, this ride, just as Scream, is usually a walk-on or a 15 minute wait tops). X2 wait time was about the same as Yolocoaster, 1 hour and 20 or so minutes. Rode it somewhere in the middle, felt a bit rough as usual but of course, fun as always. No flames that day. The audio was back on, I know most people on here like that.

 

Overall a pretty good day at Magic Mountain.

[Vonni]

^ Glad you had a good time. The wait times you listed actually dont sound horrible. Just curious, why did you skip RR and Superman?

[mykolbeta]

^ Glad you had a good time. The wait times you listed actually dont sound horrible. Just curious, why did you skip RR and Superman?

 

We had just gotten off of Green Lantern and the group I was with was ready for some water on their hot bodies...so first I said Tidal Wave only gets you wet (read: soaked) if you get on the bridge rather than actually riding it. The group decided they just wanted to be teased, but also ride something, so I suggested Jet Stream. Then we just kept going in that direction, passing the closed Apocalypse, going to Tatsu, and X2...by the time we finished X2 it was 8:10 pm, roller coaster riding was closed for the rest of the night. I miss the days when MM would close at 11 pm or 12 midnight.

[Vonni]

^ Glad you had a good time. The wait times you listed actually dont sound horrible. Just curious, why did you skip RR and Superman?

 

We had just gotten off of Green Lantern and the group I was with was ready for some water on their hot bodies...so first I said Tidal Wave only gets you wet (read: soaked) if you get on the bridge rather than actually riding it. The group decided they just wanted to be teased, but also ride something, so I suggested Jet Stream. Then we just kept going in that direction, passing the closed Apocalypse, going to Tatsu, and X2...by the time we finished X2 it was 8:10 pm, roller coaster riding was closed for the rest of the night. I miss the days when MM would close at 11 pm or 12 midnight.

 

 

Ok I see. I agree about the hours as well. I've wished that for my home park too (SFStL). 9 or 10 pm is just too early in my opinion, especially for trying to get night rides!

[SharkTums]

Started counterclockwise so we went to Yolocoaster first, I hadn't been on it yet. It was in fact running only 1 train, but surprisingly the 1 hour and 20 minute wait didn't feel all that long. The loop is cool, but my favorite part is actually from the tunnel reverse launch on towards the end. Definitely one I would re-ride a few times if the line were smaller.

 

Whoa whoa, I don't follow this thread that much anymore but why the hell is the brand new ride only running one train like eight weeks after opening?!?! Is this a temporary thing? Like a bad wheel or has this been going on for a while???

[singemfrc]

^ Yes there was a defective part on the other train, supposedly they're waiting for a replacement part and running the remaining train in the mean time. Most reports have been that even though they're running one train, they have been dispatching aggressively and moving the line pretty quickly.

[SharkTums]

^Sorry but as fast as they can move the line (and 1hr20 at opening doesn't seem that great to me) this is why everyone freaked when they only bought two trains. So sad. Hopefully if another park gets one of these they'll invest in a third train.

[singemfrc]

Can't agree more..relative to the cost of an entire ride I would think that the cost of an extra train would be a worthwhile investment, but I'm not surprised considering past actions like sending Riddler's third train to SFNE (Or current ones like doing Scream's rehab in the middle of summer..it's been running one train for months now)

 

I'll be getting my first rides in on a very busy day, Saturday 8/31, so I'll definitely be headed there first thing in the morning.

[Sir Clinksalot]

This is the sign that's out front of Full Throttle, they put their "Annual Maintenance" sign out there ... for a ride that's been open less than 2 months. (Photo Courtesy of Our Mountain FB page)

[VTown661]

 

 

Ok I see. I agree about the hours as well. I've wished that for my home park too (SFStL). 9 or 10 pm is just too early in my opinion, especially for trying to get night rides!

 

You want longer hours come back during Freight Fest when park is open until 1am on Fridays and Saturday's during October.

 

And if you have a season pass remember, there are never any blackout dates for any of the season passes including Freight Fest!

[aCoasterStory]

I was at the park for a couple of hours last night. Decided to hit X2 first since it only had a posted wait of 20min. As I got into line, I realized it was actually down. I was surprised they didn't have a ride op blocking the entrance to the queue like basically every other park does when a ride goes down. It was only down for ~10-15min or so & enough people left the line that it was moving forwards. Once it came back up, though, I was shocked at how slow the line moved. They were running two trains and dispatching a train every ~3min, but the line would stay stationary for 5 or more min at a time and then not move very far forward at all. When I got to the station, I was shocked to find that they wouldn't allow preferred seating. For me this is unheard of. Why would you take somebody who has been waiting in line for an hour or more and force them to ride somewhere they don't want to if they have a preference and are willing to wait an extra train or two? I managed to talk the ride op into letting me wait to ride in the front, but it shouldn't have needed to be a policy imho. The ride itself was pretty cool. Only problem was I got distracted by my phone trying to fall out of my pocket halfway through, so I didn't get to fully enjoy the ride experience. I don't normally have any issues with my phone on coasters, but I'll be sure to put it in a buttoned pocket next time. All in all, it was a good ride in the front (inside seat), and I didn't experience any roughness/bounciness.

 

After that (which ended up taking a little over an hour), I headed back towards Apocalypse, hoping I could get a quick ride in before heading to Full Throttle right before close. Turns out Apocalypse was closed (not sure if it was a temporary thing or if it's down for a while), so I walked back to the front of the park to get in the line for FT. Thought about trying to ride something else beforehand, but it was like 7:30 and I didn't want to miss out on getting in line for FT before they closed at 8.

 

The posted wait time for FT was an hour, and that turned out to be about accurate. They were actually running both trains. I thought it was sad that they had such a problem with line jumping that they had to hand out boarding passes, but they collected them only about halfway through the queue, and that did absolutely nothing to stop line jumpers after that point (had a number of people squeeze by). I thought it was a good ride. The ride op was having fun with it--messing with people as he hit the launch, which I thought added a lot to the experience. The launch was good, but the hang-time in that loop was INSANE. The rest of the ride was pretty nice as well. I was in the front, so I'll try to hit the back today. (Oddly enough, despite having a posted sign saying there was no preferred seating, they allowed you to get in whatever row you wanted...go figure.)

[XYZ]

I really wonder how true that annual maintenance sign is. For Full Throttle, it most likely is true, though I've been to SFMM where they put up an annual maintenance sign up on coasters that had two train operation the day before.

[SoCalCoasters]

Can't agree more..relative to the cost of an entire ride I would think that the cost of an extra train would be a worthwhile investment, but I'm not surprised considering past actions like sending Riddler's third train to SFNE

 

Actually from what they said last year at West Coast Bash it wasn't really their decision to move the 3rd Riddler train to Green Lantern. Back then they were actually hoping that it would be returned to them soon.

[singemfrc]

^ How could it not be SF's decision to move their own train?

[Jew]

He meant park management. Corporate made the decision for them.

 

Regarding YOLOCoaster...that one is tough. It's partially the parks fault for not stocking the part, and partially the manufacturers fault for fabricating a POS part that failed too soon. It really begs the question, what is better: no YOLOCoaster or long line YOLOCoaster?

 

On the day Transformers made the news for "riders being stuck," another site got a picture of the sign posting a 4 hour wait because the ride could only ride at half capacity. It happens sometimes.

[dylanreich]

I would guess that the ride manufacturer would let the park know what parts they should be stocking and that this broken part was a fluke... Unless it's normal for parks to stock EVERY part, and do we even know what the part was?

And about the third train,is it now normal for Six Flags or Cedar Fair to buy three trains? Forgive me if I'm wrong, but hasn't two trains been the standard unless the coaster can run three at once?

[bostonlva]

I remember reading this back in April in regards to the Colossus treatment (unless something has changed since then and Screamscpae has not updated it yet). If this is what is planned for SFMM as the next "big" project, We should be hearing about how we should get our last rides on old Colossus before the big overhaul. SInce late 2013 would be Oct right?

 

(4/15/13) According to the latest rumors the Iron Horse treatment for Colossus has been slotted to reopen for 2015, though there is a slight chance it could be pushed back to 2016 if the stars align on another project first. Unlike the quick transformation of Rattler at Fiesta Texas, this is expected to be more of a major overhaul, more along the lines of the lengthy Texas Giant job. This will require the once mighty Colossus to be down for a period of 12-16 months. So for Colossus to be reborn in Spring 2015 it will end up having to close down to begin the project in Late 2013. Stay tuned as we try to keep up to date on what could be the most important new coaster to ever open at ‘The Mountain’ that could create an all time new world record for the park that may never be broken.

[SFMMGeek27]

Well I guess we will all find out August 29th, won't we!? So pumped!

[cmullin]

If it weren't for school starting in August, it would be my favorite month, so many coaster announcements! Can't wait for the 29th!

[FrightFest1408]

*Comment Deleted*

Edited August 18, 2013 by FrightFest1408

[Vonni]

How is Fright Fest at SFMM? I never hear a lot about it.

[singemfrc]

How is Fright Fest at SFMM? I never hear a lot about it.

The highlight for me is definitely Colossus running backwards on the B&M trains (which may be done for the last time this year). A close second is Gold Rusher in the dark, very underrated.

[rcdude]

I do have a feeling Iron Colossus is coming in the near future, but I doubt it will be announced with this year's announcements. Unless the transformation is supposed to be done for 2014 (which is possible but unlikely), it would probably be too early to announce it. I think we're more likely to see hints of Iron Colossus appear on the park's Fright Fest website when that goes live. If a message appears anywhere promoting this as the "last time ever to ride Colossus Backwards", it's a pretty good indicator something will be happening. While the ride could close after Fright Fest, I wouldn't be surprised if SFMM waited until after winter break to close it as they could use the extra capacity during the holiday period and they'd still have 18 months to transform the ride and have it ready for summer 2015.

 

How is Fright Fest at SFMM? I never hear a lot about it.

 

It's okay, but if you can only visit one of Southern California's halloween attractions it is the one to skip. I often go because, unlike Knott's, I can get in with a season pass and the park often adds special features to some of the rides, but the event really is the weakest in the area (in my experience).