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2018: Park Operations & Ride Availability

Austin Towers said:
I've never heard as much nonsense and as an electrical maintenance engineer it makes me laugh even more. The rides stop and start all day exactly the same way as they would if you started them all first thing in the morning. That's like Oblivion control having to ring Rita control and say "ok you can launch now, the shuttle is at the top now and the lift hill motor is not running, go go go."

There might be exceptions for start up current on large pumps for the rapids etc but they're talking rubbish.
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Not disagreeing with you. But for most of the rides (but not all) starting and stopping in the day is not the same as morning start up. Especially the coasters and their lift hills, which are in an always on state in the day. They just slow down when not in use, but remain in an always on and powered up state. This helps even out the load and power spikes on the substations.

This issue is more widespread than people realise. Ripsaw, for example. Could only ever run on very tame settings when the Skyride was in operation, due to power issues. It used to be insane when the Skyride was closed. But with both in operation, their simply wasnt enough power to use the ride to its full potential. Resulting in quite a tame ride, compared to how the ride could run when all four of it's three phase motors were getting a healthy supply of juice. Plenty of videos about showing this, as this issue existed throughout the lifetime of Ripsaw. I am sure people on here remember this, as it was quite a widely known issue.

Also sorry to be pedantic, but Rita 'charges' before a launch. Meaning no power is being taken from the grid at launch time for the launch. As the launch system charges over a period of time, there is no sudden power demand and spike, as there would be on say a LSM or LIM launch system. Which are far more power hungry, and demand huge current at launch time. Completely different to Rita and the way all hydraulic launches work. The hydraulic launch system is far far more suited to somewhere like Alton, where power can be an issue. Hence why we have a hydraulic and not a LSM/LIM launch ride at Alton.
 
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This issue is more widespread than people realise. Ripsaw, for example. Could only ever run on very tame settings when the Skyride was in operation, due to power issues. It used to be insane when the Skyride was closed. But with both in operation, their simply wasnt enough power to use the ride to its full potential. Resulting in quite a tame ride, compared to how the ride could run when all four of it's three phase motors were getting a healthy supply of juice. Plenty of videos about showing this, as this issue existed throughout the lifetime of Ripsaw. I am sure people on here remember this, as it was quite a widely known issue.

Is that when they used the joysticks in the booth to control the ride manually? Use to love Boneshaker on manual mode.
 
DistortAMG said:
Not disagreeing with you. But for most of the rides (but not all) starting and stopping in the day is not the same as morning start up. Especially the coasters and their lift hills, which are in an always on state in the day. They just slow down when not in use, but remain in an always on and powered up state. This helps even out the load and power spikes on the substations.

This issue is more widespread than people realise. Ripsaw, for example. Could only ever run on very tame settings when the Skyride was in operation, due to power issues. It used to be insane when the Skyride was closed. But with both in operation, their simply wasnt enough power to use the ride to its full potential. Resulting in quite a tame ride, compared to how the ride could run when all four of it's three phase motors were getting a healthy supply of juice. Plenty of videos about showing this, as this issue existed throughout the lifetime of Ripsaw. I am sure people on here remember this, as it was quite a widely known issue.

Also sorry to be pedantic, but Rita 'charges' before a launch. Meaning no power is being taken from the grid at launch time for the launch. As the launch system charges over a period of time, there is no sudden power demand and spike, as there would be on say a LSM or LIM launch system. Which are far more power hungry, and demand huge current at launch time. Completely different to Rita and the way all hydraulic launches work. The hydraulic launch system is far far more suited to somewhere like Alton, where power can be an issue. Hence why we have a hydraulic and not a LSM/LIM launch ride at Alton.
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In the mornings the lift hills chains will start first thing with no coaster trains on them, I would be very confident there would be less load on the motors on morning start up than during a lift cycle when it has to lift a few tonnes like all rides do on and off all day.

Another point. First thing in the morning during testing there would be no guests on the coasters so even less load on both the mechanical and electrical components of the lift hill. Mechanical and electrical loads will be higher during the day with the weight of the guests on the rides.

In that regard I'm saying that Towers statement that they stagger ride openings due to the risk of overloading the local electricity network is complete and utter bull.

Edit: And now that I've re-read what I've written they stagger ride opening and not startup so there would be guests on the rides. That knocks that on the head so I'm wrong there lol.

However. Regarding Rita I was only using it as an example, I've no idea how it works but I recall it uses a huge hydraulic motor?
My knowledge of hydraulics is limited, I'm more into the control side of things. Out of curiosity how do they charge the hydraulic power for a launch? Is it a case of it builds hydraulic pressure to a certain point every few minutes then releases it all in a few seconds during launch. If that's the case yes the hydraulic pump motors will probably run at a constant rate all day and there would be no spikes in electrical power for running Rita apart from switching on the hydraulic pump motors on startup in the morning. This would then make Rita an exception and Towers may be right in staggering startup in this case. This and the pumps for the rapids etc are the only things I could see causing issues. I'm sure there are more though so there could well be something in what they're saying the more I think about it.
 
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Themeparksandy1981 said:
This issue is more widespread than people realise. Ripsaw, for example. Could only ever run on very tame settings when the Skyride was in operation, due to power issues. It used to be insane when the Skyride was closed.
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That's the first I've ever heard of that. Back in the 2000s the Skyride always opened and as far as I recall, Ripsaw operated in various programmes without any difficulties.
Themeparksandy1981 said:
Is that when they used the joysticks in the booth to control the ride manually? Use to love Boneshaker on manual mode.
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Joysticks for Ripsaw or Boneshaker? There was no manual joystick control for Ripsaw.
 
So far as I know, the only reason Skyride is closed, is because the gondolas are not air conditioned and it gets too hot in there.

Makes sense when you think about it tbh. Not that it counts as an excuse.
 
Alsty said:
That's the first I've ever heard of that. Back in the 2000s the Skyride always opened and as far as I recall, Ripsaw operated in various programmes without any difficulties.

Joysticks for Ripsaw or Boneshaker? There was no manual joystick control for Ripsaw.
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It could run the sequences but it ran slower and less punchy when the skyride was running. You used to note a more intense ride if the skyride was down.

Theoretically there where manual controls on both rides but they never ran them manually, there was a Joystick for the fountains on ripsaw though.
 
Alsty said:
That's the first I've ever heard of that. Back in the 2000s the Skyride always opened and as far as I recall, Ripsaw operated in various programmes without any difficulties.

Joysticks for Ripsaw or Boneshaker? There was no manual joystick control for Ripsaw.
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There are videos on Youtube showing the same ride sequence running with and without the skyride in operation, you can visually see a clear difference in speed. Youtube is blocked on my work computers else I would try and find one.

I remember getting rides in the dark at Halloween after the skyride had shut due to lack of light. Oh boy did that thing used to flip loads more than it used to with the skyride open. Nearly blacked out on it a few times when it was running with full power. Amazing ride.

Yeah both Ripsaw and Boneshaker had full manual control capability. Just it was park policy not to use the manual control on Ripsaw. If you go ride an identical top spin model at a german fair however, they seldom run them in automatic.

You have not properly rode a top spin until you have experienced one in manual mode with an experienced operator at the controls. There absolutely is an element of skill involved in controlling a top spin in manual and getting the best from it. This could be quite possibly why Alton only ran it in automatic, to ensure a consistent ride for the guests and to minimise mechanical wear on the ride, which could potentially increase in manual mode.
 
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DistortAMG said:
There are videos on Youtube showing the same ride sequence running with and without the skyride in operation, you can visually see a clear difference in speed. Youtube is blocked on my work computers else I would try and find one.

I remember getting rides in the dark at Halloween after the skyride had shut due to lack of light. Oh boy did that thing used to flip loads more than it used to with the skyride open. Nearly blacked out on it a few times when it was running with full power. Amazing ride.

Yeah both Ripsaw and Boneshaker had full manual control capability. Just it was park policy not to use the manual control on Ripsaw. If you go ride an identical top spin model at a german fair however, they seldom run them in automatic.

You have not properly rode a top spin until you have experienced one in manual mode with an experienced operator at the controls. There absolutely is an element of skill involved in controlling a top spin in manual and getting the best from it. This could be quite possibly why Alton only ran it in automatic, to ensure a consistent ride for the guests and to minimise mechanical wear on the ride, which could potentially increase in manual mode.
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I went on one at V2001 in weston park, I felt like my skull was going to rip out off my forehead. Great fun!
 
Went on Ramases Revenge at Chessington a few years ago when the place was dead, first go felt similar to Ripsaw (but bit more intense), they then said "anyone want to stay on for a second spin?" - think they put it in the top cycle as it was worlds apart.
 
Believe me, Rameses is a sad shadow of it's former self. Back in the glory days of the late 90's, if you could bag the last ride of the day, you'd get every single ride program back to back, no pausing, lasting a good ten minutes! :D
 
DistortAMG said:
There are videos on Youtube showing the same ride sequence running with and without the skyride in operation, you can visually see a clear difference in speed. Youtube is blocked on my work computers else I would try and find one.
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Does anybody else have a link? I've tried to find some comparisons on YouTube but can't seem to find any. I'd be really interested to see it :)

Edit: I'd hate to be on that ride in that video
 
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