Extended Closure

Interesting new job opportunity with Z...

Why is it interesting? Sounds like exactly the kind of position you'd find in almost any industrial engineering company. This would be an underling to another person already doing this.

To strengthen our Engineering team we are looking for an engineer to join the Stress Analysis area. Reporting to the Stress Analysis Chief Engineer, the person will be responsible for verifying the feasibility of the technical solutions, guaranteeing the safety and integrity of the machine for its entire life cycle.

Activities:

• Calculation of static and dynamic stresses on mechanical and structural components using manual calculations, multi-body analysis (Adams) and FEM (Ansys, Straus7)
• Performing resistance checks static and fatigue
• Interaction with the technical and electrical offices during the engineering phase of the attraction
• Documentation to support the attraction (Stress Analysis Report, FMEA Report, NDT Schedule, Foundation Loads Report)
• Performance of accelerometer / strain gauge measurements during the testing phase of the attraction (in the company and on the installation site if requested)
• Interaction with the inspection bodies during the phase of Design Review

Requirements:

• Master's degree in mechanical, aerospace or structural engineering
• Knowledge of FEM software (Ansys and Straus7 preferred ) and Office package, in particular Excel
• Knowledge of the English language (minimum B2)
• Availability to travel
• Knowledge of Adams and Visual Basic.

It's interesting because of the timing, in light of current events.

Fact- Zamperla erred in the design of it's trains, on a major, high profile project with major implications for Zamperla's stated goal of advancing it's roller coaster business.

Reasonable inference based upon all factual evidence available to the general public today (including CPs public statements, the presence of the third party testing service on site, and the photographic evidence of removed and redesigned wheel bogeys): The problem likely has something to do with the wheels and or bogeys on the original design being overstressed.

Given that you (Jeff) staunchly defended the company line about Intamin's trains being overstressed by Maverick's heartline roll (despite my suspicion that it had at least as much if not more to do with the stress that would've been imparted upon the rider), and your apparent capacity for rational and analytical thought, I would think that you would agree that this inference is reasonable given what we know.

Fact- Zamperla posts a new job opening for an engineer specializing in this sort of thing right after their company made a significant high profile mistake in this area.

Now, if that doesn't at least qualify as "interesting" to you, then I postulate you might be in the wrong business (or hobby).

I'm not damning Zamperla here, stuff happens on a new ride and on one's first endeavor of this scale. But this tidbit is indeed noteworthy to me.

Encouraging to see they use Ansys for FEA! But also discouraging that they list Visual Basic as a desired job applicant skill 🥺

^^I don't think it's a stretch to say the job posting is entirely coincidental. Could it be to help out with TT2? Certainly. But it's not like the posting says "Needs expertise in designing wheel bogeys for 100+ mph roller coaster carriages." As stated in the listing, they already have a chief engineer for that discipline in their company.

Also, we don't know that the mistake was the result of a bad stress analysis. There's numerous ways for a design to fail. Stress failure is just one of them. Those re-designed wheel bogeys could resolve a number of things. Is the timing of the posting interesting? Sure. But to immediately correlate a job posting to Zamperla seeking help figuring out the TT2 problem, and call someone else unreasonable for saying otherwise, is kind of wild.

Sure it could be coincidence. Nobody said otherwise. Just that it is interesting given the circumstances. But if I were Zamperla and my engineering team made a mistake this big, I'd be looking at what I might need to rectify internally, and adding expertise in the area of deficiency would certainly be on the table.

DA20Pilot:

Given that you (Jeff) staunchly defended the company line about Intamin's trains being overstressed by Maverick's heartline roll (despite my suspicion that it had at least as much if not more to do with the stress that would've been imparted upon the rider), and your apparent capacity for rational and analytical thought, I would think that you would agree that this inference is reasonable given what we know.

I'm not staunchly defending anything. I know what people who would know said about Maverick. I also know that my kid said he had a sandwich today. Neither of these had anything to do with Top Thrill 2.

Fact, I guess.

But Zamperla already has a "chief" engineer in this area. I have senior software engineers on my team. I need another. You know why? Because there's more work to do than people to do it, not because there are bugs in the software. That gig will be filled long after the ride is back in operation.

I mean, since we're making reasonable inferences.

DA20Pilot:
Fact- Zamperla erred in the design of it's trains, on a major, high profile project with major implications for Zamperla's stated goal of advancing it's roller coaster business.

That's just, like, your opinion, man. To err means they did something wrong. If I were a betting man, I'd say they did everything right, and encountered something unexpected anyway. Maybe that's what happened with the Maverick train too. Fact: The sandwich was the right thing to do for lunch.

Jeff:

...I'd say they did everything right, and encountered something unexpected anyway.

I agree that the job posting is coincidental, but I am having difficulty reconciling "did everything right" with "encountered something unexpected anyway". A nontrivial part of the engineering process involves predicting the behavior of a system. And based on what we can observe it seems pretty damn obvious that something occurred that Zamperla did not predict, or did not sufficiently predict the effect of (FMEA), given the ride has been SBNO for nearly a month and a half now.

Still no update…. At this point I doubt it will even be up and running by the 4th.

I mean, it's cycling this morning so that's a non-official update.

At this point, I doubt we hear anything official from the park until they have the ride working towards "testing to open" status. It would be kind of silly to put out a statement that simply says, "we're still working on it!".

I could be mistaken but I don't think that DA20Pilot isn't suggesting that this job is FOR helping with TT2, Rather it's in response to the mistake made with their design process in TT2. IE they are hoping to avoid the same mistake in the future. I can't see how anyone can say this is a coincidence, it seems pretty reasonable to see that Zamperla is seeking to fix an obvious weakness in their process. Which is good right?

I also agree with DJ. When I spoke to my engineer friend who works in the theme park industry after TT2 first closed he said "I'm surprised that Zamperla didn't see this coming". He thought that using a complete Aluminum chasey and bogie would have always resulted in something like this.

Or it could just be that they have an increased workload and are looking to staff accordingly. A glance at their jobs page shows openings in the following positions, in addition to the Stress Analysis Engineer position:

• Shipping Administration Specialist
• Prototype Mechanic
• Procurement Manager
• Forklift Operator
• Carpenter
• Mechanic
• Electrician
• Mechanical Designer
• Marketing Specialist
• Quality Control Technician
• Junior Controller

That sure reads to me like a company that is increasing staffing across the board, rather than addressing one specific shortcoming.

Maybe it’s to work on CPs new project which is already “under signed contract “. Could it be from Zamperla? As they say, bad things often come in threes: Wild Mouse, TT2, Project x?

😉

It's just nice to see coaster designers getting the same level of "oh they're hiring for X position, that must mean Y" that game developers have been getting for years now.

The timing is what it is.

But you folks do realize retirements, promotions, life events happen in all sorts of businesses world wide, right? Are companies supposed to ignore them because the timing might look "odd"?

Maybe the engineer responsible for the current design got tired of reading these sort of posts and decided to hit the screw it button.

Who knows outside of the company?

djDaemon:

A nontrivial part of the engineering process involves predicting the behavior of a system.

Of course, but things in real life will always be different to some degree. You have to make a judgment call on how far you simulate and virtually test against cost, budget, time, etc. This came up recently in talking about bridges collapsing from things running into them. Sure, you could test for every situation and possible mitigation strategy, but the cost would be enormous and you'd never build a bridge.

Aerospace exemplifies this as well. NASA's contractors have spent billions on SLS, and launched one time as a test. They've spent $12 billion and counting, and anticipate another $2 billion per launch to get it as close to perfect as possible. By comparison, SpaceX has spent $5 billion on Starship, and so far they've flown four full stack prototypes (most of which they blew up), the last one with essentially successful landings, plus the initial landing test flights of just the ship. What they're learning isn't theoretical, it's based on observation of real things, at a fraction of the cost.

Where does roller coaster train design fit on that spectrum? I dunno, but they definitely don't have government cost-plus contracts to fund their R&D. I'm willing to give them a little grace, because nothing has ever been built like this that launches three times and spends much of it over 100 mph. They'll figure it out.

djDaemon:

I am having difficulty reconciling "did everything right" with "encountered something unexpected anyway".

Amen!

Frog Hopper King:
I don't think that DA20Pilot isn't suggesting that this job is FOR helping with TT2, Rather it's in response to the mistake made with their design process in TT2. IE they are hoping to avoid the same mistake in the future. I can't see how anyone can say this is a coincidence, it seems pretty reasonable to see that Zamperla is seeking to fix an obvious weakness in their process. Which is good right?

Yes, I'm not saying one way or another whether it is coincidental. Could be either. But given what happened, I'm sure Zamperla management is evaluating what let to the failure of their design to perform as expected after only 8 days. And that could very well result in adding expertise to a new division if they identified a deficiency with the amount of in house talent and expertise.

Fact is, the train designed failed. So, either internal engineers made a mistake despite having adequate competence, or internal engineers lacked the expertise and experience to accurately predict the real world performance of their design.

If it's the latter, I would expect them to fortify the ranks.

I'm not saying whether Zamperla failed to exercise adequate diligence during the design process or not. For whatever reason, the design failed.

I expect they will learn from it, make appropriate adjustments internally, fix the design, make Cedar Fair whole, and I expect that once they do this, we will have a reliable ride and Zamperla will go on to have future successful installations of these trains and large scale coasters.

Jeff:

Of course, but things in real life will always be different to some degree.

Right, and that's where FMEA comes into play. And the evidence suggests a significant misstep in that process, given the ride has been down for ~90% of the season so far, and counting.

And there's nothing to suggest this failure was the result of some external factor like a boat ramming into it or whatever. And it's not rocket science, so I'm not sure what SpaceX has to do with anything.

To suggest that Zamperla "did everything right" is just looney tunes, in my opinion. I mean, let's consider an alternate reality where Intamin was awarded this contract, and the Intamin-built TT2 was still SBNO heading into July. Would they be getting the same "this is fine" treatment Zamperla is? I'm skeptical.

Yes, I agree that they'll figure it out. But to continue to suggest that this is not a major screwup does not strike me as a remotely objective view. Obviously YMMV.

You're impossible to respond to because you get hung up on every little word that isn't a perfect analog when someone is speaking in generalizations. It's exhausting.