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Chessington World of Adventures Resort

Matt.GC said:
I'm starting to think I'll never be able to ride this thing. I can't stand the slow queues at Chessington as it is and this looks boring even for kids, so I can't think of a situation in which I would find myself there riding it.

I find it incredibly incompetent that they've installed yet another low capacity coaster, with a dull layout and then decided to make it even worse by lowering the already crap capacity to save a few quid on full size air gates. You couldn't make this stuff up.

My little girl is the target market of this thing and has been on Wodan, FLY and Taron. She's either walked on to them or waited a max of 45 mins (for Wodan). If I suggested to her a drive down to Leatherhead to wait 3 hours in a slow moving queue to ride a much duller coaster than the afformention ones she's been on already because it's themed to a movie she watched when she was 3, she'd think I'd gone crazy.
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Probably fair to point out that not all kids are lucky enough to be able to go to theme parks in mainland Europe though? It’s also reasonable to point out that there’s quite clearly a distinction between a ride like Taron and Mandrill Mayhem in that there’s a fairly substantial group of people who would enjoy the latter but not the former, I assume the ride is mostly aimed at them.

Comparing a ride at Chessington World of Adventures with huge investments are two of the best theme parks in Europe, which, particularly in the case of FLY, took several years to build, is probably not the best starting place.

Of course most people who have experienced Phantasialand (I haven’t yet but will in July) are likely to prefer that to Chessington, and Taron et all to Mandrill Mayhem, it’s also probably fair to say that the fact that you’re enough of a coazter fan/ enthusiast to join an Alton Towers forum probably rubs off on your daughter a bit so she’s likely to have far more discerning taste than many will.

The ride looks absolutely fine, I’ve not ridden it yet as I’m too old for the Chessington demographic so it will be a case of going when we go with my wife’s cousin, when I do I suspect that the throughput will be the issue but I’m everything else will hit the target for what they’re aiming for.
 
RE: Capacity, when we were there we measured dispatches roughly every 3 minutes (generously, assuming nothing went wrong), which was with relatively experienced riders since we all entered the competition. That's 560pph, but it might be worse with GP, breakdowns, people not wanting to go back row etc.

I can confirm you're not allowed to stand behind the air gates until the previous group has vacated their seats
 
BenTechy66 said:
RE: Capacity, when we were there we measured dispatches roughly every 3 minutes (generously, assuming nothing went wrong), which was with relatively experienced riders since we all entered the competition. That's 560pph, but it might be worse with GP, breakdowns, people not wanting to go back row etc.

I can confirm you're not allowed to stand behind the air gates until the previous group has vacated their seats
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That’s really shocking, they needed something that munched through queues and this clearly isn’t it.
 
The area can be as pretty as they like, but if that is actually how they will operate it with that sort of throughput then they'd have been better off leaving it as a picnic field.

Surely they can't have designed, built it, and  then considered what might be a safe way to operate it, can they? Can they?!
 
Hopefully it doesn't take them too long to realise that operationally they need to squeeze it as much as possible.

I notice the train seems to overshoot its final brake quite a bit when it is fully-laden, possibly adding a few valuable seconds to turnaround times.

It reportedly rolled back from the first inversion today.

Sorry if this has been answered, but do we know if they have a spare train for it?
 
Tom said:
Hopefully it doesn't take them too long to realise that operationally they need to squeeze it as much as possible.

I notice the train seems to overshoot its final brake quite a bit when it is fully-laden, possibly adding a few valuable seconds to turnaround times.

It reportedly rolled back from the first inversion today.

Sorry if this has been answered, but do we know if they have a spare train for it?
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They don’t have a spare train
 
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I thought id give our review on the new area from the passholder preview

1.mandrill mayhem. Lets hope they sort out the operations as today for the 3pm-5pm they were terrible. I dont think they dispatched 6 trains in the 1st hour. Also they appear to be holding people at the entrance to the station then after people have come off the ride then sending them to the gates if this is how they will operate it for the public even with the reserve ride system there will be long queues.

Onto the ride we sat row 6 the last but 1 and i have to say the launch back up the spike was good felt slight floater airtime and the launch through the station was decent. The inversion is probable the best part and you go through it at a steady pace.

However the downside to this ride is the upwards banked spiral who on earth thought tht was a good idea needs firing. It was probable 1 of the most uncomfortable experiences ive had on a coaster falling sideways into the restraints putting alot of pressure on your shoulders it was terrible.

Overall 5/10

2.Mamba strike. This ride was alot smaller than expected no where near the standard funfair version of the ride. And the seats are tight if you are above average build or a person with big hips you will struggle to fit in the seat my wife had to come off and she isnt a big woman at all.

The ride itself was meh. You went round half a dozen times 1 way then stopped for a split second at the top before going the other way for a couple of times. A fairly short cycle and nothing spetacular.

Overall 3/10

Ostrich stampede - this is similar to mandrill the time to load took an eternity. The ride itself looks quite good off ride but on it was very poor if it lasted 30-40 seconds im being generous you go round a few times bounce for 1 or 2 turns then thats it. Again the aeats are snug but not as bad as mamba strike.

1 thing i noticed is on the 2 flat rides the exits have locks on them and this slows everything down as on the 1 ride they cudnt open the lock so we were waitinflg around until another member of staff came to have a go.

Overall 2/10

General Area - The themeing is really good it looks fantastic and the music adds to that. The area is smaller than what i thought there are no toilets in the area the nearest are a short walk away near dragons fury. The food outlets looked standard. We were dissapppointed with the shop not a great deal of merch on offer.

Overall 7/10 mostly on the themeing

For the rest of the park today the only coaster we.got on was vampire. I dont get this obsession with having holding points outside the station buildings and letting a few in at a time. Just let us queue we know how to do it it isnt a hard task for most of us and the staff inside are so slow spending half there time chatting to each other and again another rant so much time is wasted by holding us bk from the airgates until the train has emptied we all know what to do.
Compare today with AT and they are on a different level they have upped their game massively with the speed and efficency they need to come down and show them how to do it.

Overall operations 5/10
 
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In non-Jumanji related news, Chessington Buzz have been putting lots of cryptic tweets online hinting that another new coaster project may be in the pipeline for Chessington, as well as a Vampire retrack:





Isn’t this all very interesting?

Say what you will about Chessington Buzz, but they correctly predicted both Shipwreck Cove and the indoor waterpark, as well as numerous elements of the World of Jumanji, months before they were announced, so they clearly have an inside source somewhere.
 
Matt N said:
In non-Jumanji related news, Chessington Buzz have been putting lots of cryptic tweets online hinting that another new coaster project may be in the pipeline for Chessington, as well as a Vampire retrack:





Isn’t this all very interesting?

Say what you will about Chessington Buzz, but they correctly predicted both Shipwreck Cove and the indoor waterpark, as well as numerous elements of the World of Jumanji, months before they were announced, so they clearly have an inside source somewhere.
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From the same people who think £13.50 is good value for a hot dog.

As for the operations on Mandrill Mayhem, this whole not being allowed in to the air gates until guests have got off the previous train sounds dire. I understand the H&S risks of being allowed to stand in the air gates as the train comes through at high speed, but in that case use air gates like you see on GIBs or RC Racer. They may not look the best, but at Chessington, capacity needs to be maximised. I'm sure they could have themed them to fit in.
 
It’s a bit hard to get excited about whatever new projects might be coming to the park when there are so many issues with throughputs, poor ride availability, and excessive queue times. Seeing as this latest headline coaster of theirs might actually have made things worse given how some aspects of it seem to have been spectacularly poorly thought out they’d need to pull an RMC sized rabbit out of the hat to redeem themselves with any potential new coaster.
 
Rob said:
From the same people who think £13.50 is good value for a hot dog
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Technically they only thought it was OK with the annual pass discount. Which is a problem that has been in the Merlin parks for years, the AP discount prices are often "OK" if not good value, but the other guests are paying way over the odds.
 
Will do a full trip report as soon as I've received some photos, but I got two rides on Mandrill Mayhem yesterday morning. Once on the front row (inside seat) and once on row 5, same side (outside seat). I also did one ride on each of the flats.

The throughput issues and loading faff aside, MM is a great coaster. A lot more fun than it looks off ride. The launches are surprisingly quick and the hangtime on the inversion is crazy. The spiral is a strange sensation without being uncomfortable. The inside seats are butter smooth but the outside seats have a slight bounce, although nowhere near as bad as on Swarm.

The flats are ok, Mamba Strike isn't too fast but the cycle is very long. Ostrich Stampede on the other hand is surprisingly fast but the cycle is incredibly short. The theming is great on both though, especially the former.

And the overall area looks really nice, the theming is plentiful and the audio is everywhere.

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I find Chessington Buzz to be in the dregs of the fan site world when it comes to how they operate and then attack other fan sites, but they definitely know the future plans for the park.

There does seem to be a change in how Merlin are funding their parks (well Chessington and Towers, other than the new coaster Thorpe still seem to be a bit neglected but maybe that will change).
 
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