It sways!

i was at Six flags, Ohio...a few days ago....i saw pretty much the same swaying as i did on the wicked twister.

-Dennis

Welcome to New York City

Ya I thought that was pretty cool when I knoticed that on opening day.  When I pointed it out to my friends other people heard me and started to get a little scared.  I thought it was funny!

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Cedar Point Rules

You have to love Intamin's engineering. The box track supports its self without supports. Wicked Twister, Xcelerator, and Superman The Escape give the scariest swaying I've ever seen of any other coasters.
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Adam Black | adam@mouseinfo.com
www.americacoasters.com | www.mouseinfo.com
*** This post was edited by xShorty 6/3/2002 1:18:05 AM ***

One of the best quotes I've heard in the queue was from some girl yelling "Why is it doing that? I don't like that! Why can't they make the green [supports] go all the way up!" That was great.
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Michael McCormack CP '02: 11
Magnum XL 200: 93 (218)
Millennium Force: 2
Wicked Twister: 21

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All that I do know, is that the man who welded all three cracks in the track said "I do not feel safe even standing under the thing."

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Cause we all know how much Cedar Point loooooves to put its patrons in harm's way. I'm not necessarily doubting your recollection, I just doubt the guy said it in any seriousness.

Seriously...

"Zane": What you're saying borders on libel. The truth is that you have zero credibility and generally speaking I feel that anyone who would post this kind of nonsense is making it up for attention.

If you really do work there, you probably won't for very long... they're on to you.

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Jeff
Webmaster/GTTP, Sillynonsense.com
"As far as I can tell it doesn't matter who you are. If you can believe, there's something worth fighting for..." - Garbage, "Parade"

seriously Jeff....all this it sways nonsense is B.S....nobody really know the facts about why it sways...i know this for a fact though...as i said before.....It supposed to sway. What More do you need to know.

I'm not going to say what I believe is going on but, when I got to CP today I saw two maintainence guys up on top of the rear support.They appeared to be doing some type of work. I came back to WT a bit later and they were testing the ride for a few mintues. After, maintainence went back up the tower and were doing work.

Again, I'm not going to say what I think or if I agree with anyone. I'm just telling you guys what I saw today.

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2002- Raptor Hot Shots
Force Laps: 429
Wicked Twists: 66

I just wanted to resummarize what has been said about the swaying of Wicked Twister, so that no false rumors eminate from this discussion and everyone can be 'at ease' with the sway.

Since the tower and the track are not designed to simply absorb applied forces, they need a different method to return to a state of lowest potential energy. Thus, they sway in order to dissipate the lateral forces.

Depending on a number of factors including mass, lateral bracing/moment capacity, depth of structure, and the tensile strength of steel, some structures will sway more than others. For example compare the empire state building and the CN Tower:

Sway facts about the CN tower, the world's tallest free standing structure, located in Toronto (structure: reinforced poured in place concrete):

With a wind of 120 KPH, the main observation deck's elevation of 1122' sways 9 inches.

At the sky pod's elevation of 1,465' the tower sways 1.5.'

At its uppermost height of 1,815' 5" the tower sways a total of 3.5 feet.

On the other hand, the uppermost occupiable storey of the Empire State Building (moment frame steel superstructure with masonry cladding system) at 1,250 feet will only sway 1.48 inches in a wind of 110mph.

Therefore, the Empire State building is resisting/absorbing more laterally applied forces than the CN tower.

However, whether a sound structure is displaced 1.48 inches or 3.5 feet, it will return to its original state by means of some form of harmonic motion be it simple or complex.

With that said, Wicked Twister has more in common with the CN Tower, as they are both more slender than the ESB.

Using the tensile strength of steel (typically between 30-60ksi), the 'thickness' of the respective support structures (track and base), and the maximum forces applied, you can be assured that the Intamin engineers have calculated the maximum allowable bending streses and DID NOT exceed them in designing the ride.

**Want to credit my sources on sway magnitudes, CN Tower heights, and Empire State Building heights respectively:

http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/msway.html

http://www.cntower.ca/

http://www.nypl.org/research/chss/spe/art/photo/hinex/empire/about.html

*** This post was edited by DaveTKoch 6/3/2002 10:51:45 PM ***

I think I understand that... yup I do.

~*kP

Whatever is going on at the top of the green supports, it's pretty obvious that the maintenance was anticipated. That's why they have a ladder going up the support to a work platform. That is a high stress point on the ride, so I would think that the platform was put there for inspection and repair. To claim the ride has structural flaws is just totally irresponsible. It’s a new ride, so it’s probably under a microscope. Personally, I feel good about maintenance people on the structure. It means that it is getting the proper care and inspection, which is totally what you would expect of Cedar Point. Don’t worry about it, just go ride it and have fun. You don’t even notice the sway while riding.

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It's very hard to drink all day...
Unless you start first thing in the morning.

The State of Ohio Comes and inspects EVERY ride at cedar point each year....they come with their structual engineers....the have to check the structual integrity of the coaster and as well as its operation and braks and everything....but my point is...is that if there is a crack that would put people in danger..they would have shut it down.

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- Dennis

I say we all have to believe in the "sway" because the new 420 foot coaster will need to sway a LOT!

SEE: "CP Place=> General => The Mysterious, possible footers"

::laugh::
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God bless ya'll!!!!

What are you talking about Zane? That makes no sense whatsoever.the simple fact is ALL IMPULSES SWAY.I don't know where you heard that and I highly doubt that 1.The guy who welded it said that and 2.Cedar Point would have a coaster that is unsafe.

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Pugsly The Coaster Geek Of Cedar Point.
*** This post was edited by RaptorTwister 6/6/2002 10:37:19 AM ***

Last year on The Discovery Channel the show "Thrill Rides" was shown and they explained why the ride sways...but they were referring to the new ride at SFWoA (The SuperMan: Ultimate Escape...I think it's called.)

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CP is the best!! I will never stop loving it. You gotta, you wanna, you have to hold on Cedar Point HOLD ON!!! :) :) :)

I think everyone needs to agree with Dave Koch that we are not trying to argue this. I am just in a position to find out stuff that people who go to the point for fun would not. On that note, yesterday, Thursday, they cut a 2.5 foot section of the track completely out and replaced it with their own section of track. The piece they removed was one of the cross braces that runs between the four corners of the track.

I just have to ask, RaptorTwister, have you ever been employed by CP? Because you seem to have some pretty lofty expectations of CP. Like your comment on CP not ever having an unsafe ride. I have to admit that CP is been very lucky, but something will happen. Like with the of center section of track on Raptor, the bad compressors on PT, the E-brakes on Millenium (which already caused a roll back into another train during testing earlier this year), the bad motors on the gemini. CP already has had a few incidents in recent history. Such as the chain on Corkscrew breaking and a wheel that was knocked off hitting a guest in the head, and not to mention that vertigo already fell over last winter and is now sitting in the employee parking lot for the dorms.

Zane, if I'm reading your post correctly, you're saying that they did not remove a section of track, but rather, removed a cross brace and replaced it with a new one. Although what you say may be true, I'm not going to comment directly about Wicked Twister at this time, because there's no hard visual evidence or other confirmation other than what you have written above, and I don't want to feed fuel to the speculation fire... ;)

I will say though that it seems highly unlikely that a piece of vital structure was actually removed. My reason for this follows:

In steel construction, if part of the structure such as a column needs to be reinforced due to a new load that will be placed on the structure during remodeling, etc.; that element will not removed, but instead, be reinforced with the addition of a new shape. This could be a steel plate or an additional W shape column welded to the already existing structure to improve its Moment of Inertia. (Moment of Inertia is directly related to load bearing capacities of a structure and its resistance to buckling and deformation under a load. More moment of Inertia = better) My point being, though, that you don't make a structure less sound to make it more sound...

Additionally, if we make the analogy of WT's track being like a beam connected to another column (the super structure), you would find a moment resisting connection(rigid connection) at the points where they are connected. To make this connection stronger, the web of the beam is often reinforced all the way through to the opposite flange allowing the loads to be fully transferred to the right places. To see how this concept applies to WT's track, go to GTTP Photo Gallery and look at that nice rear shot (2). (No it's not what those of you with your minds in the gutter were thinking; it's a shot of WT! ;) ) Anyway, that's a perfect example of what I'm talking about, and it's seems to be plenty reinforced to me, along with the rest of the track.

With that said, I can't really think of another place that would apply to what you described in your post, so right now, I have my doubts as to what you actually saw. It may not have been what you thought it was. Some elaboration may help clarify this.

-Dave Kochman
Pittsburgh
**two typos
*** This post was edited by DaveTKoch 6/8/2002 2:31:57 AM ***

And OH...Some post script here:

If you look at the WT Down Alot thread, the explanation for the welding you saw may have alot to do with whatever part they say is coming or has come from Intamin, since you didn't really say where the welding occurred this time. That points more toward some type of mechanical problem (LIMs) than anything structural.

Now, if only Jeff would add some different smiley faces to the forum software... :) ;) ???
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-Dave Kochman
Pittsburgh

*** This post was edited by DaveTKoch 6/8/2002 3:52:11 AM ***

Zane: You are so full of crap. No one was hit in the head with a piece of Corkscrew chain, I had a friend on the crew when it happened. The difference is that she had the common sense to know that you don't talk about what goes on at the park when you're employed there. Have I mentioned they're on to you?

Various mechanical problems happen at any park. They're machines, they break. For you to make these stupid implications that it makes them unsafe is irresponsible and a scream for attention. Give it a rest.

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Jeff
Webmaster/GTTP, Sillynonsense.com
"As far as I can tell it doesn't matter who you are. If you can believe, there's something worth fighting for..." - Garbage, "Parade"