Accident on SFNE S:ROS and impact on MF/CP

For those who don't know, the trains on Six Flags New England's Superman: Ride of Steel collided in the station yesterday.  Check out Coasterbuzz for the full details.  My theory is that the retractable brakes that slow and stop the trains were open, thus letting the train fly into the station.  Since MF has the decelleration ramp and the retractables merely aid the kicker wheels to stop the ride, CP and MF will not be impacted by this much.

Any comments?

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Scott W. Short, Rail Junkie
mailto:scott@midwestcoastercentral.com
http://www.midwestcoastercentr

While I tend to agree with you Scott for the bigger picture and I do believe that MF will incur no downtime during op hrs because of it, I still have to think that Intamin is Intamin and it will be evaluated during off hrs at night and such...Nothing major but rather just a Manufacturers overview of its breaking system and such...

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http://www.msu.edu/~armbrus9/cp.html
mf laps = 100! No More No Less!!
Wheres the Electricity!

I have not yet heard what happened at Riverside, so I can't say for sure what happened.

I have seen one message suggesting it was a sensor failure in the station which caused the ride control to think the station was clear and allowed the train to proceed...Scott, I wonder if this is why we saw all those optical pairs on Wildcat.

I don't understand how the station could have been identified as 'clear' though. My initial theory is a worn out kicker wheel.

We know that those trains can overshoot; that's why there was a dent in the front of Millennium Force's blue train. But I suspect that this one is going to be chalked up to a controls failure or a maintenance failure at SF Riverside, and I doubt it will have much of an effect on Cedar Point.

Dent in the Blue Train, what on earth could have happend ;)? I think those wheels are the result of most of the overshoot problems (at least when I'm there) that MF has so often.

Still a fully loaded train comes flying into the retractables Would the wheels be enough to stop it?

An another note, one night those retractables appeared to not want to retract and the trains had trouble advancing.

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2001 Force Laps-116
2001 Magnum Laps-238
6/11/01 Gemini Laps 100

With the amount the trains are braked by the magnetic brakes, I cannot see this much damage being done by a low speed colision due to the advancing wheels.  I have a strong suspicion something happened to cause a few or all of the solenoids holding the brakes up to lower. 

MF should be fine since I don't believe any of the brakes are retractable.  What does kill me about the whole thing is I had concerns over their whole design last year when I first saw it.  General rule of thumb is there should always be 50% spare at least as far as braking is concerned.  I don't see where that ever existed on that design and Intamin may very well get nailed by this.

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-Brian
I really should be working...

I think that at least one set is retractable (because I constantly see references to "retractable magnetic brakes" on this board.) Why would they be retractable though, if the magnetic brakes don't stop the train? I believe that the fixed magnetic brakes on MF have enough redundancy that a single failure wouldn’t cause an accident.
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DIPPIN DOTS!!!111 THEY ROXOR YUR WORLD!!1!

About those brakes, can't they wear out after a period of time and not be as strong as when new?
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2001 MF Count: 0
Favs:
1. Iron Dragon
2. Raptor
3. Gemini
4. Magnum
5. Demon Drop

Magnetic brakes? They don't involve any friction, do they? Without friction, there wouldn't really be anything to wear. The advancing tires, that's another story...
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DIPPIN DOTS!!!111 THEY ROXOR YUR WORLD!!1!

The half life of a rare earth magnet (the kind used in the brakes) is somewhere in the area of about 15,000 years if I remember correctly.. Looking it up...

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- Egg Whites -
MF total - 385 laps
June 11th, 2001 - Gemini 100

I don't think MF has any retractables, but just kicker wheels. I just can't remember after looking at the brake run on all the times I've rode it. The thing about MF is it just "rolls" into the unload station unless the unload and/or the load station aren't clear. I think MF overshoots its load whenever the load and unload stations are filled. Not sure though
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Brian Z.
Assistant Webmaster
Kennywood Park Unlimited
www.kpunlimited.com

There are retractables on MF...the very last set fold out hydraulically, I believe...

The calipers on the block brake are retractable. I believe there are no brakes at all in the two stations. The retractable brakes are used in locations where you want to be able to move the train after it stops.

Wolfhounde, with the magnetic brakes, if there were 50% excess braking available on the ride, the train would never make it back to the station.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Correction, Dave.  The trains would make it back to the station, but just very very very very very slowly.  Magnetic brakes don't stop a train completely, but slows it down proportionally to speed.  Eventally, the braking force would fall below the momentum of the train due to gravity at slow speeds allowing the train to roll.  That's why there are kicker wheels to stop the train.

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Scott W. Short, Rail Junkie
mailto:scott@midwestcoastercentral.com
http://www.midwestcoastercentr

It's kind of like the old question, if you drop a ball in a frictionless world and each bounce it comes up exactly 1/2 from where it last fell from, how long until it stops bouncing.  Answer: never. 
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UCSigEp

Isn't Disney World a people trap run by a mouse?

MF 2K1: 4
MF life: 12

Yes, There are no brakes in the station.

When they test trains in the morning, they are still cold and empty, It takes forever for them to get through the brakes.

Its funny to see the reaction of guest sometimes when the retractables close. Since the catwalk thing ooutside of the station its directly connected to the track supports (and inturn the brakes) it shakes violently and makes some noises.

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2001 Force Laps-116
2001 Magnum Laps-238
6/11/01 Gemini Laps 100

Theres no way any of the braking systems of superman ros worked.  The train came in at 40 mph and slammed the first train partially up the lift hill.  Thats why intamin is at sfne looking at what happened.  I heard the other intamin hypers at six flags parks are down to 1train running because the're afraid of what happened.  But the bottom line is cp wont have the problem effect mforce as long as intamin doesn't tell cp to shut it down or something wierd like that.
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Hypersonic XLC- 17 seconds of ride....only 1.8 of which are fun

I don't think that Intamin has a say over what Cedar Point does...I think that's upper management's decision.

When Chaos malufunctioned at Michigan Adventure, Chance didn't contact all the parks that operated that type of ride, Cedar Point took action immediately as its own choice.

Actually, Chance did contact all the owners of a Chaos and ask them to close down until they knew what had happened.

...I stand corrected. I wonder why no one over at Coasterbuzz brought up the fact that their local parks shut them down. They just focused on Michigan Adventure and Cedar Point...

The Chance Chaos here in Vegas was NOT shutdown.