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Ride Availability/Operations 2022-24

Went today, operations wise - absolutely terrible start, Spinjam and Twistatron were the only thrill rides that opened on time. We planned to start in dark forest but were told Rita would be a late opener at 9:25. Joined Thirteen pre queue and then told at 9:57 it was opening on time. Walked past a closed Hex to TWoDW to find a closed Gangsta Granny which was the nearest area so thought we’d get away with doing. Had no choice but to start on Flavio’s, by which time GG had opened, followed by Dark Forest. Saw Thirteens gate being opened so went there, Rita was then already down again by the time we got off Thirteen. Generally on the up from here, managed 20 rides.
Thirteen’s ops were great, no stacking on 3 trains
Oblivion 2 stations not even building up a queue, running 6 shuttles and stacking for no more than 30 seconds
The Smiler - 4 trains, no stacking, all 4 trains were on the circuit at once at one point. Just as we did the final turn, the station was clear so the other 3 were somewhere else on the circuit
Galactica had MUCH better ops this time around, not building a queue up at all but throwing out 3 crafts consistently.
Wicker Man had a train on the lift before the other had come through the structure consistently on most dispatches. Aside from the shaky start, I don’t see how the operations could’ve been any better.
Funk’n’Fly was just sat there closed all day, no work happening on it all, didn’t even look like any staff were on site for it, something wrong with the centre of the ride apparently, didn’t get anymore information.
 
Funk n fly was having work done fri lunchtime as we had a coffee. It was raised higher than I've ever seen it go and it didn't rotate whilst we were there.

They were working on the central column
 
Ethan said:
Is that even possible? You're on the final turn, 2 trains on the lifts so thats 3. So where was the other train. Still it sounds like the ops were great on it which is nice to see
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I thought it was running 3 and then realised it was running 4. 2 were on various parts of the track, one was at the base of the first lift
 
If Smiler is running flat out, as you head towards the bottom of the second lift hill, one train should be coming half way up the first lift hill, and the train in front should pass over your head after the last inversion.
 
djtruefitt said:
If Smiler is running flat out, as you head towards the bottom of the second lift hill, one train should be coming half way up the first lift hill, and the train in front should pass over your head after the last inversion.
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So are you suggesting that the ride’s maximum dispatch interval is slightly under a minute?

That’s interesting. Gerstlauer claims that The Smiler can do 1,200pph, which would equate to a train every 48 seconds.

Granted, this is on 5 trains, and I’ve heard 985pph bandied about as the theoretical on 4 (Coaster Bot used this as The Smiler’s 4 train theoretical in his Alton Towers operations video). This would make sense seeing as I have personally seen Smiler achieve dispatch intervals of slightly less than a minute during this season.

I wonder whether reinstating the 5th train would see the ride attain Gerstlauer’s claimed theoretical throughput of 1,200pph? On 4 trains, I honestly struggle to see a lot of room for improvement in Smiler’s current operations, so I’m admittedly not sure where the additional 240pph would come from other than through filling the gap between the 4th train leaving the station and the first train returning (which seems to occur when the ride runs flat out).
 
The SRQ would need batching downstairs again to take away SRQ bag faff in the station, the gate and chain for station staff would be better removed, the gates on the station would need to be sped up and then you'd need the staff properly hammering the trains out constantly.
 
Again? I know it goes through these spells but it was only the start of the month when it was last closed for a few days
 
Danscott22 said:
Again? I know it goes through these spells but it was only the start of the month when it was last closed for a few days
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Had 3 or 4 full closed days already hasn't it?
Edit: Smiler had some down time this morning but is open again on 3 trains. Not sure if it was on 4 before it shut
 
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I believe that was for track work if I remember right, however it does seem to have quite a lot of downtime for maintenance reasons. But it’s hard for me to compare it to other wooden coasters with this being the only GCI in the country. Hopefully just something quick and minor.
 
Wickerman does tend to suffer downtime around this time of year when the temperature changes in a short space of time. It has happened a few times. No idea if there is a link but is it feasible the track could be impacted by sudden increases in temp that then require maintenance?
 
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