dragster overhaul

Hey there all.Hope we are enjoying the off season and coping well.Just a quick question and hopefully I didnt overlook anything before I posted this.
During the season with the problems with Dragster there was talk about overhauling the launch system to make it more reliable.Does anyone know exactly what work is going to be done and if it has begun yet?The cameras pointing to the coaster are out so there is no way to see what is going on.Just curious thats all.
Thanks in advance!!!!!!
By the way after only going once this season I am not handling the offseason very well and already looking to next year.

I would guess work started sunday night or monday morning. Why else would Sandor be at the park......maybe a looper is down the road?

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Dan Haverlock
TTD Rollbacks 4
TTD Complete Laps 73
"get a job man!"

There was an announcement back in late June/early July that if they couldn't get Dragster up and running by the middle of July, they would close it down for the rest of the season and rework the whole hydraulic system. Of course that didn't happen, but they're gonna have to take this whole off season (November through April) to perform extensive matienance on it and prevent constant breakdowns.

So who'd you get your information from again? It was running pretty damned good by the end of the season, considering. Most of the problems they had with it were unforeseen mostly due to the fact they HAD NOBODY TO RIDE IT AND LAUNCH IT CONTINUALLY DAY AFTER DAY. With this being said, get a grip and stop hypothesizing and making it sound like you know what you're talking about. So unless you're a silver tag that knows what's going on with it or a maintenance worker themselves, shut up and stop spouting lies.

Uh, are you calling him a liar about the announcement of possibly shutting down Dragster for the rest of the season or that they will have to do extensive testing on the off-season?

Because there was an official announcement from a CP official (I think it was Kinzel) that if they didn't get the ride up and running July 4th or a little afterwards that they would shut it down the rest of the season. At one point this summer, they pulled their Dragster ads since it was down for so long.

As for the extensive testing and maintenance in the off-season, I think that's a given. You know there was obviously a problem with the ride when it shut down for extended periods of time this summer. They have fixed the problems as they came (some maybe temporarily) but I'm sure there are still areas of improvement. They definitely have to make sure that the problems with the generation of heat is taken care of for even the hottest summer days.

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Everything that has a beginning has an end.

The Matrix Revolutions

*** This post was edited by CP_bound 10/31/2003 8:30:41 PM ***

And here is a good point; If they would just leave the ride as is, then there are possiblilities of long down-time like the beginning of this season... so If I were a betting man, I would bet they are going to spend some good time with dragster to get ALL the kinks out.

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TTD: 7 (Rollbacks seen: 32)
MF: 22
WT: 10

I'll bet they started taking it all apart the night the park closed for the year. Now they can really dig in to the problems. This could lessen rollbacks next year. I have seen plenty, but never got to ride one.

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Gemini 100 - 35
Aaron Radatz Centenial Theater '03

I know there was announcements of shutting it down earlier in the season, however most of the problems were and are unforseen. If you do not know something is going to happen, how can you fix it? How is it a given they're going to work on it non-stop and fix 'everything that's wrong with it' when mostly they don't know what's wrong with it. I'm just saying some people need to stop spouting propaganda like they own the park. Like I said in my last post, "was running pretty damned good by the end of the season, considering. Most of the problems they had with it were unforeseen mostly due to the fact they HAD NOBODY TO RIDE IT AND LAUNCH IT CONTINUALLY DAY AFTER DAY."

Translation: You cannot fix what is not broken. It is not broken unless it breaks. It cannot break unless it is running. ERGO, Yes they will probably do as much as they can on it (Like they do for EVERY OTHER RIDE), but this does not mean they are going to call in every single world engineer to work on it the entire winter. They will do whatever they can, replace anything that looks worn, most likely give it another checkup in the spring, and then they are good until the ride has some more load and launches for the day. They by no means are going to have every mechanic working on that one ride like the other pretty much stated for the entire off season. Believe it or not, there are actually *gasp* other rides in the park that need preventative maintanance.

Whether it's true or not, I don't know, but I'd heard a few people around saying that a lot of the problems that the ride had this year were due to things that CP elected not to go with when the ride was built. A few years ago, I probably wouldn't have bought this argument, but with our beloved park's tendency of being cheap over the past couple years, maybe it is true. Maybe the ride should have had a cooling system from the beginning, rather than the garden hose model that was installed mid season. Perhaps there are other things that could be added during the offseason to make the ride more reliable. What those things could be? I don't know, but it's just a possibility.

-Matt
2001 Magnum Crew
2003 Magnum Crew

ummm.... yea i have to agree with matt. the park did make a few bad choices by using cheaper parts than what they should have- and now the are paying for it. there were a few things that were broken/worn at the end of the season that need to be fixed. but the work they are probably going to do is changing the worn/broken parts and working on the computer system to get the timing of things more accurate. and then again, i do not know for sure....i guess we will all find out come spring.

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dragster crew '03

Ben, just wanted to say that awhile back on virtual midway, there was an article posted about TTD that specifically stated that they would run Dragster as if it were actually open until Christmas if need be (looked for the article but couldn't find it)... As for weight? that's why they have the water dummies and launching it continuously is the only way they will find the problems. And to say if it isn't broken, don't fix it? I'm sure that's exactly what they thought at the beginning of the season, but we all know that despite that, it WAS broken. Just because we don't see/know what's broken, doesn't mean everything is working fine with no problems. I think YOU'RE the one that needs to stop pretending as if you know what's really going on and stop bashing people for stating things that have been expressed by ACTUAL CP officials.

Ben: You need to settle down a little. You should also look up "propaganda" regarding its definition.

The ride never ran smooth, not ever. The closest it ever got to running smoothly was toward the end of the season, and even then it wasn't great. Things were "broken" from the start.

Word around the campfire is that some cost-cutting could at least be partially attributed with certain problems, or at least the half-assed cooling in the motor building. The Intamin engineers were allegedly telling people that they spec'd something more intense, thus the mid-season upgrade.

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Jeff - Webmaster - GTTP - My Blog
Blogs, photo albums - CampusFish
What time does the water show start?

Not to mention other cost-cutting measures were that were taken..

*cough* halloweekends themeing *cough*

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Werewolf Canyon: it's a lot like shopping for a christmas tree. Only, with werewolves.

The saying comes to mind... you get what you pay for. It doesn't apply to all things, but in this case I'd say it would.

Whatever the reasons are, it's extremely clear some 'tweaking' needs to be performed, and that it's more than likely taking place.

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18 straight years of real thrills and counting...

Jeff is right. I was there closing day and when the ride first opened they were launching half fulled trains and there was a 2 minute period between each launch. A hour or so later the ride began to launch every 40 sec. and loaded every car except the last one. Now if you say the ride was working fine then why would this happen. CP needs to get the ride running consitantly all the time, not a few hours after it opens.

Also, with this topic of CP fixing TTD over the offseason, has there been any disscusion about the themeing on the trains coming back. I this was disscused many times over the summer but what about now. I found it odd that the themeing was used for the HW themeing, and maybe that it won't come back.

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CP Coaster Guide Ride Count
TTD: 2; WT: 11; MF: 7; Mantis: 4; Raptor: 7; Mean Streak: 7; Magnum: 4
*** This post was edited by Gomez 11/4/2003 1:20:16 PM ***
*** This post was edited by Gomez 11/4/2003 1:22:02 PM ***

IMO,

it'd be nice to see it come back, but I've gotten so used to TTD without the themeing, I don't know, I'd be happy either way with it I guess..
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Werewolf Canyon: it's a lot like shopping for a christmas tree. Only, with werewolves.

I believe it was a major mistake on CP's side not building the train themeing into the actual train. Instead they are held on by a few bolts. That could have saved them alot of trouble.

Also, next season (after all this supposed tweaking), don't complain or be surprised if they occasionally don't run the last few seats. It would be a good assumption, that if all is running well mechanically, that the wind speeds are too high to use the whole train. Just a forewarning.

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MANTIS ROCKS 2002 & 2003

I would think that tweaking would allow all the seats to be used more often than they are now, but who knows - the tweaking they're doing on Gemini is also going in a backwards direction! :)

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-Matt
2001 Magnum Crew
2003 Magnum Crew

Unfortunately, i would be willing to say that Dragster will most likely always have problems no matter how much *tweaking* is done this offseason. Seeing as how it hasnt ran well from the start, and how the problems that arise are unpredictable, it may very well be that the only way to solve the problem (and i know that im gonna get a lot of crap for this) is to start over...get the launching gear out of there and start scotch free...because then it will be easier to determine the real problems of the ride.

I also think its interesting how Xcelerator has been running very well and except for the structure addition the past year, it has been open...how much different is the Dragster propulsion system from Xcelerators? I mean, it was supposed to be a "tester" and the tester passed, so why not the big one? One more question...why weren't they loading the back seats?

And I think themeing is the last thing on CP's mind for TTD- at this point, Themeing isnt costing them $, downtime is.

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-Adam Carolla is GOD
-*Perturbed at the world*
-There are 10 types of people in this world that understand binary...those who do, and those who don't.

shake it like a poloraid pic-sha

This speaks strongly for Intamin. When Cedar Point devised Millennium Force, they took the lowest bidder. Intamin creates safe working rides for less than other companys can.

With the hydraulic launch system, Intamin did many things that simply haven not been done before. Top Thrill Dragster was a very challenging ride for Intamin. The event handling for this ride needed to be much more complicated then any other ride. Not only does the PLC syntax change with the number of trains, but also with the various modes of operation dry/wet and automatic/manual for example. Other variables effect the operation of the ride such as weight, water, temperature, and mechanical condition of various parts. (wheels, bearings, and the like) This produces a nearly infinite number of conditions that the ride will have to run in.

Any engineering project runs into problems along the way. If something doesn’t work the project isn’t usually scraped because of it, but a way around the problem is developed.

Say the hydraulic motors ran overall at 80% efficiency. I’m sure there are more losses from motor friction, hydraulic fluid motion, the pumps, valves, hoses, ect. If the output power is 10,000 HP or 7.46 Megawatts then the input power would have to be 9.33 MW at 80% capacity. The other 1.87 MW are the losses that are converted to other forms of energy such as heat, light or sound. The majority of energy lost is in the form of heat. The other loses such as sound or light is negligible at best. The comparison of 1.87MW of heat is 18700 100 watt light bulbs. Simply put, the motor unit is expelling an insane amount of heat. It takes an incredible amount of cooling just to do a half-assed job.

Considering the ride system Top Thrill Dragster uses, I think it did fairly well it’s inaugural season.

:edit: The post clumped together when I replied.

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Eddy the retard is awesome.
*** This post was edited by SteelMonsters 11/5/2003 2:42:55 AM ***