Maintenance during the off season

I was wondering does CP take the trains off all the coasters or only certain ones? In this picture (click on the link below) you can see Wicked Twister's train is off.
http://www.topthrilldragster.com/public/inside_park/rides/thrill/ttd/photo/picture.cfm?id=131

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New For 2003 Top Thrill Dragster Tallest Coaster Ever!!
*** This post was edited by ThePoint 2/15/2003 7:30:47 PM ***

As far as I know, they take the trains off of all the coasters for preventitive/regular maintenance. I could be wrong though!

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MANTIS ROCKS 2002 & 2003

No your not wrong Brian. They do take all the trains off for maintenance. They had the Blue Streak, Mean Streak, and Cork Screw trains off by the first week in Nov. this past season. And they had just started taking off Raptor trains. They could have had more coaster trains off but thats all I seen.

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Screamsters 2001
Millennium Force/Screamsters 2002
Race Park/Rip Cord/Screamsters 2003

How does the process of taking one of these trains off work?

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"Give Me Liberty.............Or a Bran Muffin."
-Colin Mochrie-
-Whose Line Is It Anyway-

On most coasters I believe they just slide the trains car by car of the end of the trasfer track like on Millennium Force. Same for Raptor, probably Mantis and most other steel coasters. Im not sure how they do it for Mean Streak and Blue Streak but im sure it is a similar process for them. Once they get a car off the track they just use a crane and lower it to the ground or onto a truck.

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Screamsters 2001
Millennium Force/Screamsters 2002
Rip Cord/Screamsters 2003

For some of the trains, I think they have wooden frames sort of like a pallet that they set the individual cars on. These frames can then be picked up with a forklift. Thay also prevent the wheels from sitting on the ground.

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"I bet it pulls 5 G's going into that loop."
"Far Out."

This is true also. Some of the steal coasters have a steal pallet that looks similar to the track. They just line up the pallet and push the car onto it. They do this on Millennium Force.

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Screamsters 2001
Millennium Force/Screamsters 2002
Rip Cord/Screamsters 2003

How would they take WT's Train off. There is no tranfer track.

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New For 2003 Top Thrill Dragster Tallest Coaster Ever!!

Same way they put them on but in the opposite direction.. Support them.. dissconnect the trains from each other.. remove the upper wheel assemply.. and lower.

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June 11th, 2001 - Gemini 100
VertiGo Rides - 82
Technical Services 2002
Fright Zone Screamster 2002

I may be wrong, but don't they take apart and rebuid every train after a season to ensure safety, ect.? I heard that once...

Yes, they do. I'm not sure if they do it with all of them. I know Magnum they take apart the white part and leave the lap bars in the train part. It's hard to describe..I think they take all the wheels off all the trains to the coasters for the ones that they don't take completely apart. Most of them are put on paletes and stored on them for the winter..Like Raptor and Mantis for the year that I saw them during the off season (00')..

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Park Services 98'
Snake River 99'00'
Peanuts ATL 01'
GW/SS/Schwab TL 02'
Kiddy Kingdom TL 03'
*** This post was edited by coasterchick 2/16/2003 3:54:53 PM ***

Im not sure about all the coaster trains but on Millennium Force they take the trains apart all the way down to the last bolt. Im assuming that they will do the same with Wicked Twister since its only a year old.

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Screamsters 2001
Millennium Force/Screamsters 2002
Rip Cord/Screamsters 2003

Here is a picture of Xcelerator with the shell, seats, restraints ect. removed. It looks... bare.

:edit: It appears that there taking that train off, a later picture showed the entire train on the ground.

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Millennium Force 03'

*** This post was edited by SteelMonsters 2/16/2003 4:13:23 PM ***

I know they did took apart MF trains last year because they repainted the trains..

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Park Services 98'
Snake River 99'00'
Peanuts ATL 01'
GW/SS/Schwab TL 02'
Kiddy Kingdom TL 03'
*** This post was edited by coasterchick 2/16/2003 5:01:42 PM ***

I don't know for sure about CP, but at SFAW in Houston they take all trains off and strip them down to nothing-piles of bolts, wheels, seats, etc. As far as I have been told, they do this every year during the off season: strip all parts off and inspect/replace worn parts. There are some really good behind-the-scenes photos at sixflagshouston.com. Look under event photos and see behind-the-scenes photos of Texas Cyclone being re-tracked, Greezed Lightnin' being serviced, etc.

http://www.sixflagshouston.com/lsct2000.html

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ALL CLEAR. ENJOY YOUR RIDE.
*** This post was edited by Bamaboy 2/16/2003 5:10:00 PM ***
*** This post was edited by Bamaboy 2/16/2003 5:11:03 PM ***
*** This post was edited by Bamaboy 2/16/2003 5:12:02 PM ***
*** This post was edited by Bamaboy 2/16/2003 5:14:19 PM ***

I am pretty sure that CP also strips down and rebuilds the trains during the off season. They also do it to the cars of the flat rides. There was a nice article, I believe in the Plain Dealer, that talked about off season repairs last winter.

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-Chris Woodard
"If you're standing in an uncomfortable position, that means you are in the right position because you are riding Mantis!" - Mantis ride op doing spiels on closing day.

They take apart and overhaul all cars and trains that they can in the off-season. An example of one they can't take apart all the way is the cars on Power Tower. Those cars can not be removed from the towers unless they break the framing of the cars. Even so, they still winterize them.

The off-season is very important and a busy time at Cedar Point. Even if there is no new ride, existing rides must be winterized, overhauled, repainted, rebuilt, inspected, etc. A big part of the superior uptime during the season is because of the extensive work done over the off-season.

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What is most anticipated event of 2003? the debut of Dragster, the release of Metallica's new album, the release of Terminator 3, or the release of Matrix:Reloaded...tough call.

Actually.. the only part left on the PT "cars" IS the frame.. They are completely dissasembled before winter hits.

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June 11th, 2001 - Gemini 100
VertiGo Rides - 82
Technical Services 2002
Fright Zone Screamster 2002

Here's a pic of PT in the offseason that came from this site's photo gallery. There are some other off season pictures there including Iron Dragon, Wave Swinger, and Matterhorn.

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-Chris Woodard
"If you're standing in an uncomfortable position, that means you are in the right position because you are riding Mantis!" - Mantis ride op doing spiels on closing day.

That picture shows the seats still on the frame. I noticed this past November that they had taken all the seats off the frame as well as the Cedar Point and Power Tower banners.

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Screamsters 2001
Millennium Force/Screamsters 2002
Rip Cord/Screamsters 2003