Drayton Manor Park

[flyingguitar]

The only rides at Drayton that actually do invert these days are The Wave and Air Race. Obviously The Wave can’t get stuck upside down because of physics. Air Race would be more likely, but even if it did break down or get emergency stopped, the ride vehicles will automatically return to their natural position on the ground.

Sounds to me like the guests might’ve been on a school trip and have over exaggerated what really happened. That’s just speculation obviously but I can’t imagine any other scenario because it’s a clear lie.

both can* get stuck upside down

The wave it is extremely rare (as in only happened once before) but if something jams the wheels it can cause it to stop in an inversion, however the only time I know about it happening is like 20+ years ago at the demon at six flags from what I recall one of the the wheel assembly's wasn't properly maintained and broke, jamming against the chassis and track. in and way everyone would have known about it because it would have been a multi hour problem, with fire service called.

air race is more interesting I would actually say if it was e-stopped they may stop the cars high in their position, this is because it used to be common for them on flat rides to cut power to everything and let the ride return to the home position, however they found out that if a guest entered the ride area, and the ride was thus e-stopped nothing could be done to prevent the guest from being squashed by the returning ride air race could pose a similar risk (if all the cars lowered they could knock into someone causing serious injured).

 

[Matt N]

One thing I would say is that “stuck upside down” does seem to be a default term for any ride breakdown among some non-enthusiasts, even when the ride is not actually upside down (for example, the tabloids refer to Galactica being stuck on the lift hill as being “stuck upside down”).

I’m not saying the person wasn’t stuck on a ride, but I wouldn’t read too much into the exact terminology used.

 

[Skyscraper]

It must be roughly 10 years ago they chanced the opening times as way before I had kids and only went once or twice a year and that was for the fireworks event.
Back then the car park opened at 8:45am and you were allowed into the park at 9am as we always use to go to the cafe that was at the top of the park for a full English breakfast (that became the grill inn) The Zoo opened at half 9 then we would spend roughly 55 mins walking round the zoo and then would go and start queuing for our 1st ride.

Onto another topic saw this on FB


If this is true would it have been Air Race?

It really did happen, here's the video!


View attachment 6a47b63f0c0002e60cfc5a7f92c07fb7.mp4

Yikes is all I can say

 

[Matt N]

I stand corrected!

I didn’t know that was even something that those Air Races did… I assumed they would return to ground level in an e-stop situation.

 

[DiogoJ42]

I didn’t know that was even something that those Air Races did… I assumed they would return to ground level in an e-stop situation.

I'd like to think they are supposed to!

 

[Hid]

What are peoples opinion on Drayton Manor for me its my 5th favourite park in the UK with the combination of great Flat Rides and Good Rollercoasters intertwined with a peaceful atmosphere on the lake.

 

[Ciaran]

I stand corrected then. I didn’t know Air Race had brakes!

 

[Matt N]

What are peoples opinion on Drayton Manor for me its my 5th favourite park in the UK with the combination of great Flat Rides and Good Rollercoasters intertwined with a peaceful atmosphere on the lake.

For me, it’s one of the stronger non-Merlin parks in the country. Off the top of my head, I’d put Pleasure Beach and Paultons higher, but Drayton could maybe be my 3rd favourite non-Merlin park.

Coasters-wise, my favourite is Gold Rush, which is an excellent family coaster that really pleasantly surprised me! I think it’s a brilliant little ride, with some really fun twists and turns and surprisingly punchy launches while also boasting a surprising ride duration! I didn’t have terribly high expectations, but I liked it a lot! The Wave and Accelerator aren’t bad either, to be fair, but I don’t think they particularly stand out for me. The Wave doesn’t have the most exciting of layouts, and Accelerator, while fun enough in isolation, isn’t a particularly standout ride even compared to other family coasters in the UK. I feel Jormungandr is showing its age quite badly now, with the train really struggling to get around numerous parts of the course and the ride being a bit rough when it does get up to speed.

One thing I would applaud about Drayton is that it is quite varied; they have 2 major water rides, numerous flat rides and 2 dark rides on the side as well as the coasters. I don’t go a bundle on flat rides in general aside from drop towers and a few other less spinny types (I like a good Screamin’ Swing), so I would maybe say that Drayton’s non-coaster lineup is not as much to my personal taste as that of some other parks now that Apocalypse is gone, but I can’t deny its variety.

I technically do have a park ranking spreadsheet, but I’m not sure I could reel off a UK ranking for Drayton that easily, as I’ll admit I find it much harder to rank parks than coasters. I find them far more circumstantial and harder to tangibly rank; I’ve visited Drayton on very quiet days most recently, so if I’d visited on a busier day more recently, my experience and thoughts could be wildly different.

 

[Alphe86]

Drayton ranks highly if I’m with family. And middling if it’s just me and the other half.
Although lapping SF10 between the school run on burning days is always fun.

 

[siralgenon]

Surely it'd only take two people to push the weight on the ground and it would rotate back around?

 

[rob666]

Not if the gearing was engaged but not powered, the stopped motor and transmission would hold the gearing and arm rigid, wouldn't it?

 

[flyingguitar]

Not if the gearing was engaged but not powered, the stopped motor and transmission would hold the gearing and arm rigid, wouldn't it?

depends on the type of motor, gearing, if there are other braking devices (such as solenoid brakes, or DC injection braking)

Surely it'd only take two people to push the weight on the ground and it would rotate back around?

You need to remember what happens when that comes down, it may have been designed to hold them still I am not sure if this ride type is designed in such a way (it could also just be stuck in the perfectly wrong position where the COM is above the pivot), the reason it may designed like that is that if someone gets into the ride area it isn't a good idea to lower all of the vehicles as if the person is where the vehicle will fall it will smack them with a multi ton vehicle

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

Gold Rush on a single train is only marginally better at dispatching than The Wave, it would seem.



We've been queuing for 35 mins so far, from just outside of the station building. I've seen the same three people use the Easy Access Pass lane to go around 3 times so far. I am surprised that there is not a timeout, especially as everything here is a single train operation.

The merge host is mixing the trains 50/50. 12 from Fast Pass / Easy Access Pass, 12 from the main queue.

 

[Themeparksandy1981]

All the major rides that operating today was on a minimum of 1 hr queue.
They extended the park hours to 6pm today cause of this

 

[Alphe86]

Good to see the park busy but can’t help it’s somewhat inflated by terrible operations

 

[Manchester1894]

Visiting a park June to August is sadistic for the enthusiasts unfortunately. Especially at Drayton with their ops

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

All the major rides that operating today was on a minimum of 1 hr queue.
They extended the park hours to 6pm today cause of this

I left at 2pm, having only ridden Gold Rush, Thor and Drunken Barrels.

Operations were a complete and utter shambles today, with The Wave outperforming Gold Rush with ops (never a good sign).

The Castle Bar was without alcohol at all, as they were awaiting a delivery later in the day.

The queues for food were at least a 20/30 minutes wait.

The park cannot cope when it is busy. The middle, around the lake, felt very close and claustrophobic. No space to relax and wind down. Having both of its main coasters only able to throughput fewer than 350 people per hour is pathetic.

That's before we even mention the food prices. As I had literally nothing else to do there, because there's not much worth queueing an hour for, below are some photos of menu prices ahead of next week's meet.

Y'all thought Aramark overcharged...

 

[Hid]

I left at 2pm, having only ridden Gold Rush, Thor and Drunken Barrels.

Operations were a complete and utter shambles today, with The Wave outperforming Gold Rush with ops (never a good sign).

The Castle Bar was without alcohol at all, as they were awaiting a delivery later in the day.

The queues for food were at least a 20/30 minutes wait.

The park cannot cope when it is busy. The middle, around the lake, felt very close and claustrophobic. No space to relax and wind down. Having both of its main coasters only able to throughput fewer than 350 people per hour is pathetic.

That's before we even mention the food prices. As I had literally nothing else to do there, because there's not much worth queueing an hour for, below as some photos of menu prices ahead of next week's meet.

Y'all thought Aramark overcharged...

Foods always been expensive in the UK Drayton is not alone the reason is quite simple supply is not reaching demand and import costs have increased in price.

Their food is pretty decent though their Pizza is really good quality and a good size

 

[Haz]

The queues for food were at least a 20/30 minutes wait.

It's been like this for the past few weeks and been terrible, They are so understaffed. every time ive been to the Fish & Chips there's been 3 staff in the entire thing (2 people on counter, 1 person cooking food) queues were back up to the end of the path and as you have said at least a 30 min wait. Most times they have stopped serving parts of the menu because they simply cant cook everything fast enough with 1 person. Prices have been inflating every year unfortunately. I'd recommend eating early for anyone visiting this season or bringing your own lunch.

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

Foods always been expensive in the UK Drayton is not alone the reason is quite simple supply is not reaching demand and import costs have increased in price.

Their food is pretty decent though their Pizza is really good quality and a good size

Yeah... No. There's no excusing it. I'm sorry, you can't bash Aramark for £15.00 for a burger, chips and a drink and accept Drayton Manor Park and Zoo's £16.50 for the the same, with similar varying quality.

food its not all bad.

Its more the price puts me off of eating there