Maverick - 5/28/07

I had a little time to sneak up to Cedar Point this morning to get a couple of spins on Maverick. I sure have been a geek the last few days, but I'm told that's OK.

I got to ride with a bunch of employees who were there to beat the Joe Cool rush, and rush it was. After my two rides, the line wrapped around Frontier Town to the Wave Swinger. Keep in mind the general public wasn't even in the park yet. This was all Joe Cool and resort guests! In fact, when I walked up toward the front of the park immediately after, Dragster only had a couple dozen people lined up prior to opening the queue. Clearly Maverick has captured a lot of attention.

In any case, first time out, I got in the front seat. My second lap was in the back. It was a beautiful morning. The crew seemed really on top of things. The trains are shiny, and station is really quite beautiful. The exit offers a nice view of the ride. The kickers pushed the train out, and the LSM's grabbed and very quickly moved the train up the hill.

It's certainly not the tallest drop, but it's such a strange feeling to go through that tilt beyond vertical. Before you know it, you're off racing through the course. The first two turn transitions are a little quick, which isn't a great thing for those restraints, but it's not a deal breaker. I found on my second ride that simply pushing your head back prevents any discomfort.

After the quick turns, up you go over that giant airtime hill. Holy crap! This is ejector style air, and it's even more intense in the back seat. Very nice. It was at the top of this that I realized I could hear the conversations of everyone on the train, because it's so quiet. They were all very excited to ride and enjoyed every minute of it.

Next was the twisted horseshoe roll, as they call it. While the marketing folk have made much hype of it, I really never bought into it. Here's what we didn't know: These things are perfect airtime hills, only inverted. While we're used to most inversions of this kind pushing you up into the seat, these things perfectly float you through them! I didn't get pressed into the seat, and I didn't drop into the restraint. Well done! They really nailed these things.

Then comes the "great great tunnel." The lighting package is interesting enough, paired with some thundering bass noise. I'm not sure how it fits into the theme exactly, other than to say that the lights at the start of the tunnel look a little like lanterns. Still, it's pretty cool, and I really look forward to some night rides when there's no light leaking into the end.

The launch is very smooth, and very steady. I think they found a sweet spot where it certainly has some intensity, but it doesn't stress you out either. Loved it. At the top of the hill, you barely notice the slight trims, and you get a slight pop of air before you dive down over the old Swan Boat pond.

And at the bottom of the dive comes the notorious "S-curve" where the heart line roll used to be. You know what? I can't imagine taking that roll at that speed. No good could have come of that. Even the quick direction change here is pretty aggressive, and that's only 90 degrees or so of rotation. I don't think anything is lost here.

After the dive over the tunnel, you do that other weird not quite an inversion thing, then another smaller airtime hill, and finally the brakes.

I think that this is the ride that the amusement park-going public has been waiting for, for, like, forever (not ages ;)). It's not too intense, it's mostly comfortable to ride, and you can ride it over and over without feeling like someone beat the crap out of you. And who knew the thing would be an airtime machine? I mean, airtime in the inversions... that's not something I expected at all.

I'm very impressed. I think Cedar Point has an insanely good winner on its hands.

Great review, glad you had a chance to ride it today. I was one of those in the mad Joe Cool rush you witnessed. :)

Just wanted to comment on the tunnel (I've made this comment elsewhere here): On Saturday for the Red Cross rides, they had thick steam at the end of the tunnel. This prevents any outside light from getting in, and all you see are the lights illuminating the fog, which you plunge through at high speed. The effect is fantastic! Unfortunately, the steam was not on today and it really makes a big difference so I hope they get that up and running more consistently.

..Al

Yes the steam make a huge difference. It was so thick on Opening Day that it was rolling out of the beginning of the tunnel and there was also a cloud at the exit of the tunnel about 10 feet out. I also noticed the airtime on the inversions, I don't believe I have ever expected that when I first got into the train, it was a real surprise.

I made the trip Monday to ride Maverick, but I chose to wait until the end of the day after the crowds had eased up. Big mistake. Maverick closed at around 7 and didn't open back up the rest of the night. So I am still missing my Maverick ride credit, and needless to say, I am PISSED.

Never take that kind of a gamble on a new ride

Jeff... saw you exiting today as we were just getting to the base of the stairs... Glad you had a good couple of rides... I agree that it is definitely a winner!

Yeah, we all saw you exiting and noticed a smile on your face.:) Great report too, you pretty much hit it on the mark.

No need for another repeat of Jeff's TR. He described the ride perfectly. Just one word describes it for me. WOW!

Cedar Point definitely has a winner on their hands with this one. I have a feeling I'll be spending a lot of time in Frontiertown this summer. :)

I was also a Red Cross Rider and with the steam/smoke/mist or what ever it was in the tunnel paired with the 2 lights at the end of the tunnel I belive it's suposed to appear as if your going into a head on collision with another train.

On a side note: the steam/smoke/mist felt like mist with very slight sting on the face but acted like fog on my glasses and seemed to smell like the halloweekends smoke. So I have no idea what it really was but it was very cool. :)

I hope that didn't have anything to do with the e-stoip in the tunnel, because it seems like that was when they turned it off.

I don't know about other factors with the steam/mist, but I heard that one of them is when employees needed to get into the tunnel to reset the launch, the steam was so thick, it was hard for them to even find the control box...

As I said in another thread, one of the members of Maverick's leadership said that the fog/mist should be coming back, but to a lesser degree then before.

I'm sure it's not steam. Chemical smoke is a lot easier.

Yeah... I should have clarified... Steam would be tough...

According to someone in some other thread, they are "mist curtains"... Whatever it may be, I am disappointed that I didn't get to experience it yesterday. But regardless, the ride was amazing without them. The lights at the end of the tunnel did look a bit cheesy with out the mist though.

Using mist would be a bad idea too. Why invite all of that corrosion when everything in there is steel?

I agree with you... I'm just going by what I've heard.

Also... directly from a blue tag on the ride... The reason the water bombs were turned off were because the trains were getting wet, and they aren't supposed to be. (These are also being re-worked). I found this funny, as the hose that is spraying over the cannon now gets the train wet as it goes through the S-Curve. Whats strange is in the morning yesterday, I didn't get wet at all, but yesterday afternoon, I got wet twice in a row... Once in the front, once in the back.

I understand not wanting to get the riders wet, but turning off one effect that gets you a bit wet, but leaving on another makes no sense to me.

Yeah, I got a mist from the hose over the canyon. Which didn't feel to good on the face. How wet you get or if you get wet at all will probably have a lot to do with the wind conditions during each perticular ride.

The chemical fog makes sense Jeff. I did hear someone say something about mist curtains, but I didn't know the person. Also, I don't ever recall the Chemical Fog messing up my glasses like that. Although I never ran through it at 70mph either. :)
*** Edited 5/29/2007 2:20:53 PM UTC by Jason Hammond***

There's nothing wrong with mist on a coaster. The launch on the lift is fully exposed to the elements. It probably gets dew on it every morning. Also, Oblivion at Alton Towers has a "mist curtain" in the hole on the drop hill. Coasters are designed to be outside and exposed to the elements.

The track and LSMs are already in the tunnel and protected from nature. So, some man-made mist wouldn't hurt anything.

I always thought mist was preferred for effects on coasters because the man-made "smoke" irritated a lot of people's allergies. Mist just got people wet.

I heard the "smoke effect" was turned off for the time being because it was leaking into the station. Smoke in a loading station isn't very good for safety. All they need to install is some ventilation in the tunnel. That would also allow them to quickly dissipate the smoke from the tunnel if required during a roll back.

halltd said:
I heard the "smoke effect" was turned off for the time being because it was leaking into the station. Smoke in a loading station isn't very good for safety. All they need to install is some ventilation in the tunnel. That would also allow them to quickly dissipate the smoke from the tunnel if required during a roll back.

I can verify that during the Red Cross rides early Saturday morning, the mist was rising into the station when a train was stuck in the tunnel for an extended period of time. Some of the crew seemed a bit confused at first by this (I was sitting on a train at the time in the station).

..Al

Have you been in the tunnel, Tim? It's like a basement. The rest of the ride can and does get wet all of the time, but it also sits in the sun. The inside of that tunnel is a steel framed building with no ventilation aside from the hole the train comes blasting out of. It's also filled with metal light fixtures. You don't want a ton of moisture in there if you don't want to replace it all in a few years.

Incredible Hulk had fog machines in it's launch tunnel. The fog left an oil residue all over everything including the drive tires. The train would proceed up the hill and when the ride would proceed to launch, the tires would slip and the train wouldn't launch. They looked into using water based misters and fog machines, but they decided against it due to the corrosion problem of the water left over.

Since friction isn't a requirement on Maverick in it's launch tunnel, they can use typical fog machines. I personally think that they should add ventilation system at the begining of the launch that runs when the ride goes down. This will clear out the tunnel making it safe to have heavy fog yet be able to clear it out to make it safer for the employees and especially the guests during an evacuation. I'm betting that the tunnel is going to get pretty hot during the summer.

Why do I always have to be "in the tunnel" or "working for Cedar Point" or "living within 5 minutes of the park" to have an opinion on something?

Did I not say add ventilation to the tunnel in my post? They could also install a vapor barrier on the ground under the tunnel to keep unwanted moisture from coming up through the ground. I'm sure it IS like a basement in there because the tunnel heats up from being hit by the sun, and water comes up through the earth with no where to go. So, it's going to be like a sauna in there. That's not too hard to figure out WITHOUT being actually in the space.

I simply said the coaster components are designed to withstand mother nature and even harsh winters. So, a mist curtain wouldn't make the ride stop functioning. They'd just have to offset it with something else.