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[2024] Thorpe Park: Hyperia - Mack Hypercoaster

I think it's fair to say something could be considered a commercial failure in the short term if it actually deters people from visiting. I wonder how many people would have visited anyway if there was nothing new to miss out on, but have delayed a visit waiting for the new thing to actually work? I'd guess a lot. That's just how peoples brains work, and it's completely understandable.

I'd say right now Hyperia is actively costing them money, which is not a return you ever want from a spend.
 
On a more positive note, Hyperia’s train is now actively being lifted off the track as we speak:
 
Will certainly be interesting to see how Merlin perceive it, obviously when they review the project it’ll be over a longer period than just the first month but the opening will be a huge negative you’d imagine. Guess there’s one of three main schools of thought:

- Acceptance that its issues have been caused by insufficient initial investment/testing and a commitment to be better next time I.e. if you’re going to do something, do it properly.

- A reluctance to take risks in the future, play it safe within the budgets and constraints.

- Or deciding that things haven’t been perfect with this project but it’s a one-off ie no lessons learned.

Who really knows, as long as Hyperia gets fixed and reliable though I’m sure most of the public will get over the initial issues and it won’t be too tainted.
 
The concern here is that it's taken two days so far to take the car out of that valley. No doubt it will need to be put back on the track again tommorow, either they run one car tomorrow or it's not open again. Then there is absolutely no certainty that this won't happen again during a test, what a mess
 
Personally, I think the downtime is being over sensationalised quite a bit. I would not consider the downtime this ride has had to be anything out of the ordinary than what we have seen for decades and decades across the world.

But there seems to be a mass hysteria about this. Maybe because it is such high profile? On the whole though, this level of downtime is well within what is generally considered to be normal upon the new opening of a ride. Some rides open better, some don't. This one hasn't unfortunately but I don't think any relationships will be getting broken yet, this is not out of the ordinary for a ride to have this level of downtime. The park will know this, so will Mack.

It's almost like no one has ever experienced many new rides opening before, so are using this attraction opening as one of very few examples to build their views and judgements on. In fairness with Thorpe Park not opening any coaster in a long time, there is likely to be a huge amount of people whos main park is Thorpe Park and have never experienced many rides opening full stop.
 
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DistortAMG said:
Personally, I think the downtime is being over sensationalised quite a bit. I would not consider the downtime this ride has had to be anything out of the ordinary than what we have seen for decades and decades across the world.

But there seems to be a mass hysteria about this. Maybe because it is such high profile? On the whole though, this level of downtime is well within what is generally considered to be normal upon the new opening of a ride. Some rides open better, some don't. This one hasn't unfortunately but I don't think any relationships will be getting broken yet, this is not out of the ordinary for a ride to have this level of downtime. The park will know this, so will Mack.

It's almost like no one has ever experienced many new rides opening before, so are using this attraction opening as one of very few examples to build their views and judgements on. In fairness with Thorpe Park not opening any coaster in a long time, there is likely to be a huge amount of people whos main park is Thorpe Park and have never experienced many rides opening full stop.
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Don't forget, this is the newest, biggest coaster in the country...thirty year record breaker.
And there are dodgy starts, and very dodgy starts.
This is one of the latter, whatever happens in the future.
 
PhalanaxOperativeA1127 said:
I mean, there's downtime which we all expect from a new ride; couple of hours here and there, maybe a day or 2.

But we're now going into the 2nd extended period of downtime for the ride (ie. 2 days plus) and its not even been open for a month.
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But that in itself is not out of the ordinary. Many rides have had very similar levels.
 
Tom said:
B&M may be lumbering bore machines at times, but at least they know about mass and inertia.

Should have gone to Intamin.
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It’s tough to say whether a different hyper coaster type would have been any more reliable. I don’t think it necessarily would have been.

The only thing I can think of is that B&M Hyper Coasters, with the element types they typically have, may not have been as much of a stall risk, but given that at very least, Diamondback and Shambhala have both valleyed in the past, B&M Hypers do not exactly carry zero stall risk themselves.

The other issues we’ve had with Hyperia could have happened on any coaster. Heck, I don’t even think that the stall is necessarily as much to do with the inherent nature of Hyperia as some think; yes, it takes that hill slowly, but other coasters take their elements similarly slowly and have either never stalled empty or only stalled once empty.
 
Miles too early to judge success of the ride.

As long as it doesn’t crash it will be a success. When it runs it is well received. I worry more about it being prone to breaking or stalling that they will need to make modifications to get it to run properly.

They would have been better getting a B&M though, I agree on that.
 
Personally I wouldn’t have wanted a B&M. My point, rather half tongue in cheek, was that B&M would probably have been less likely to deliver this blunder.

If it does end up needing a significant alteration, then it is a curve for Mack. Ultimately they have the height of an element or two out by a few inches at most.

The remit from Merlin to make it as floaty/hangy as possible came with underspeed risks. Maybe they should have challenged that a lot more.
 
Tom said:
Personally I wouldn’t have wanted a B&M. My point, rather half tongue in cheek, was that B&M would probably have been less likely to deliver this blunder.

If it does end up needing a significant alteration, then it is a curve for Mack. Ultimately they have the height of an element or two out by a few inches at most.

The remit from Merlin to make it as floaty/hangy as possible came with underspeed risks. Maybe they should have challenged that a lot more.
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What I’d say is that we don’t actually know that it needs some significant alteration at all.

The solution, if a solution is even needed, could be far more minor; the issue could be solved with different wheel compounds, or speeding up the lift hill slightly. A physical track alteration is a pretty nuclear option, and I’m sure they’d exhaust many other avenues first.

I wouldn’t be surprised if that theory I posted a few pages back had some legs to it. By my observation from footage I’ve seen, it’s only seemed to be crawling around that element when empty since they did the lift hill work during the first extended closure, so it may simply be a case of trying to get that lift hill back up to full speed. For what it’s worth, though, whatever they did when it was closed has only seemed to make the empty trains slower, with no notable difference reported or noticed when the train is full.

This stall may not even need a solution. Thus far, Hyperia has only stalled once. One stall does not necessarily indicate some crippling design flaw or some awful problem that needs to be solved.
 
Matt N said:
What I’d say is that we don’t actually know that it needs some significant alteration at all.
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We don't know, but we have a damn good idea on this latest issue. Since it first tested, it has been seen going painfully slowly through elements when empty since it was built.

It has not noticeably sped up since it was built.

It has stalled in summer and in light/moderate winds.

It has a problem of underspeed, and I personally believe this is separate to the original lift issues, and the later purported block clearance issues.

Without changes, at best it will be a pain to manage and could gain an almost Odyssey/Big One-like reputation for being a gamble coaster - particularly in wind and/or cold.
 
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