Mean Streak- Redone

Halfpint said:
...CCMR likes to jostle me around much more than MS.

I think that's where the disconnect is. If jostle = rough, then by that same measure Maverick and Raptor are rough.

For me, rough = vibrate/shake. In other words, rough is the opposite of smooth. And by no objective measure is MS smooth. Individual tolerance will of course dictate how much lack of smoothness one can handle. But even by wood coaster standards, MS is very smooth-deficient.

Yes, that is the same way I judge roughness. An analogy would be riding in a car on the road. You can have a perfectly straight road littered with potholes and you would get a rough ride. In contrast, you can have fun driving down a very twisty road on new pavement with sharp transitions in the turns and be "jostled" left and right going through the turns, especially if driven aggressively in a sports car. Mean Streak is more like the straight road while CCMR is more like the twisty road. No way is CCMR rough.

Mine Ride and Corkscrew, as well as Gemini and Magnum to a lesser extent suffer from what I call "Arrow Transition Syndrome" when sometimes the track just bends in a wacky way that screams "Arrow designed this!" and as the rider, you definitely feel it!

CCMR is uncomfortable to me because of the antiquated lap bars.

As the park ages all rides have a finite life cycle. I wouldn't be surprised at all the day I hear rides like Corkscrew, CCMR and Magnum are on the chopping block. Not that'll happen any time soon but it'll happen. With modern coaster design creating smoother and more comfortable rides, these rides, due to age and antiquated design methods will be the first to go. It's just something that from a business stand point makes sense. Replace an aging piece of equipment with low ridership for something new and shiny.

That said there are only 3 rides at Point that I currently find almost unrideable. That being MS, Corkscrew and Magnum. Magnum I can tolerate for 1 or 2 rides a trip. Corkscrew typically a once a season ride and MS... I have gone full seasons without riding and don't miss it. Hopefully Rougarou proved to Point that reinvesting in a ride to improve it has just as good of a ROI as completely tearing it down and replacing. I believe MS can be saved with either topper track and a small reprofile for over banked turns and more airtime. Or a complete Iron Horse transformation to something RMC quality insane.

The only issue I see with RMC coming in and re-imagining Mean Streak is cost. Six Flags got their first few RMC coasters on the cheap ($10 million or thereabouts for New Texas Giant, Iron Rattler). Outlaw Run at Silver Dollar City I believe was also less than $10 million. The price of RMCs has gone up since that time, however. Even the ultra-short Goliath at SF Great America was more than $10 million. Lightning Rod at Dollywood is $22 million. It's almost unfortunate in a way that the transformation couldn't have been done sooner to take advantage of RMC's early adopter price discounts.

The question that Cedar Fair has to ask is whether the true cost of a conversion - which would probably be in the $15-$25 million range - would be worth it from an ROI standpoint. I'd love to see it happen, but I can understand from a business perspective why Cedar Fair might be reluctant to have RMC come in and do an Iron Horse conversion. Add in the lower-capacity nature of RMC rides and the bouts of downtime they seem to have and there's a lot to think about.

I agree cost can be a hurdle. But the way I look at it, and the way I HOPE the park would look at it is that if you were to spend 15-25 million to remove and replace MS wouldn't 15-25 million for an RMC conversion be just as good? I guess when it comes to RMC i'm looking through enthusiasts glasses. But to me the success of previous conversions should merit it. I'm sure it's being heavily researched on the parks end.

gad198 said:

Add in the lower-capacity nature of RMC rides and the bouts of downtime they seem to have and there's a lot to think about.

Wait a minute? RMC rides have lower capacity? I didn't know this?

gad198 said:

The only issue I see with RMC coming in and re-imagining Mean Streak is cost. Six Flags got their first few RMC coasters on the cheap ($10 million or thereabouts for New Texas Giant, Iron Rattler). Outlaw Run at Silver Dollar City I believe was also less than $10 million. The price of RMCs has gone up since that time, however. Even the ultra-short Goliath at SF Great America was more than $10 million. Lightning Rod at Dollywood is $22 million.

That's a bit of an apples-and-oranges comparison. NTG and IR were conversions of existing coasters, while OR and Goliath are relatively short coasters, even compared to Lightning Rod. And part of Lightning Rod's cost presumably comes from the extensive use of terrain, which makes construction more costly.

And at the end of the day, there are still market forces at play in the amusement business. Every park has metrics that determine whether or not an attraction is economically feasible.

All that said, you do have a point - it likely would have been slightly cheaper to buy one of the earliest products from RMC. Then again, paying a little more a few years down the line may result in a better product, since RMC likely has made improvements based on lessons learned so far.

Cartwright spoke of "Arrow Transition Syndrome" where there are wacky turns on some of the coasters at CP. I can understand that some park visitors may not have ridden the ride previously & are not as familiar with the layout of these rides & what to anticipate as the ride progresses. I ride some of these quite frequently so I can anticipate the wacky turns.

Gemini is very tame until the very end of the ride. As the two tracks split for the turn home there is quite a jolt.

Mine Ride has a left turn after passing over the water where the track rises about two feet or so just prior to the turn. There are a couple other herky jerky areas on that ride. Thabto, the lap bars certainly do add to the potential discomfort, but try sitting in the front seats of any of the CCMR cars as the lap bar is significantly roomier. Do not attempt to sit in the third row of any of those cars as the lap bar may compromise your chances of future offspring.

Even Iron Dragon has some rattling near where it valleyed last October. I feel the rattle because I always cover my face with my hands to prevent the nasty blue\green water spray from contaminating me.

I don't mind Mean Streak & its roughness at all, I enjoy the beautiful views, the banked turns, the short wait lines. I like the length of the ride, it winds around & up & down a few times. I don't ride it as often as I would prefer to as my wife insists it is too rough for my youngest son and she is the boss!

I guess the point is that I enjoy the rides for what they are and do not understand the constant desire to nit-pick at flaws, as there will always be room for improvement. Just enjoy your precious time at the amusement park.

(I know that I am being a hypocrite as I have pointed out flaws myself on here in the past & probably will in the future)

I am not sure how many of you have ridden The Voyage at Holiday World, but, when I went in October, due to the rain, the crowd was extremely light. At Holiday World, they prefer that you stay on if no one is waiting for your seat. Due to this, I was able to ride that insane ride over 25 times that day. The only pain I had was in my thighs from the lap bar. I only noticed the soreness the next day when I went to Kings Island.
While at Kings Island, I rode The Beast ONE time and had a splitting headache which is about the same reaction my body has to riding Mean Streak.
The major difference between The Voyage and the other two is, even with crazy, 90 degree, high speed turns, The Voyage is not bouncy.
For those who have never ridden it, I highly recommend you get to Holiday World so you can see how much fun a wood tracked coaster can be. It's my number 1 coaster, so far.
I will be hitting Kentucky Kingdom and Dollywood, next year, to see what RMC can do.

djDaemon said:

All that said, you do have a point - it likely would have been slightly cheaper to buy one of the earliest products from RMC. Then again, paying a little more a few years down the line may result in a better product, since RMC likely has made improvements based on lessons learned so far.

I really like all of the RMC coasters I've ridden (five in total). They're all really fun, re-rideable coasters that keep you engaged. What they did with Wicked Cyclone is nothing short of amazing. It is definitely the best of the bunch and it makes me drool as to what they'd be able to do with Mean Streak. There's a top-5 steel coaster waiting there if Cedar Fair is willing to let RMC have at it.

The issue for RMC now is that their products cost as much as many B&M coasters. A Mean Streak RMC conversion sounds a lot more appealing at $10 million than it does at $20 million. The other issue is that you already have a low-capacity ride with plenty of downtime right next door in Maverick. I do think that Cedar Point would work in three-train operation and a MCBR into any Mean Streak conversion to address the capacity issue, and you could argue that with the number of coasters Cedar Point already has negates the capacity argument to a degree. You're still left with the large price tag and the higher downtime. Cedar Fair has shown that they have steered away from coaster installations that aren't reliable. It's not an accident that the recent large steel coasters are all B&Ms.

gad198 said:
The issue for RMC now is that their products cost as much as many B&M coasters. A Mean Streak RMC conversion sounds a lot more appealing at $10 million than it does at $20 million.

But that's the thing - none of the RMC conversions have cost anywhere near $20 million, to my knowledge. The only RMC that cost $20+ million is Lightning Rod, which is a new-from-the-ground-up coaster, not a conversion.

In fairness, Six Flags only released figures on New Texas Giant. They never released what it cost to do Iron Rattler, Wicked Cyclone or Twisted Colossus or what it will take to do The Joker. The only estimate on Goliath at SF Great America came from the following article:

http://www.thestar.com.my/lifestyle/features/2014/05/12/goliath-rol...se-wonder/

Park officials won’t say exactly how much the coaster cost but say it was more than US$10mil.

I also remember seeing an article someplace where RMC said that their prices were going to climb with future installations. The $22 million price tag for Dollywood's project certainly appears to be in line with that. I understand that Dollywood's project isn't a conversion, but I think it's safe to say that a Mean Streak conversion would be a lot more than the $10 million New Texas Giant cost.

If the cost to Six Flags to do these RMC conversions were such a great deal you would think that they would have no problem divulging that information to the public and/or shareholders. Why has the cost of all of the conversions, including the one coming to Kentucky Kingdom, been undisclosed? That simply can't be an accident, especially in light of the fact that the Dollywood coaster cost was made public. I'm sure that RMC probably asked Six Flags to keep the true cost under wraps so that other parks wouldn't be made to think that they would be able to get the same reduced price that Six Flags did. You would think that RMC would want to book more business. Why is everyone being so secretive about the cost of these conversions?

The cost may not be publicly disclosed, but I would be surprised if CF wasn't aware of their competitors' cap ex costs regardless, and vice versa. The industry isn't that big.

This is not to say that SF didn't get a discount on an untested product, but no way RMC is going to stay in business if they raise prices for future conversions by 100%. As you pointed out, at that cost, parks may as well buy a brand new coaster from GCI or something.

Perhaps the Ghost Rider reboot will negate a meanstreak decision. The only thing saving MS in its current state is that it hasn't, to my knowledge, put multiple guests in the hospital. It may provide a less than satisfactory experience, but lawsuits occur for greater reasons.

Ride Corkscrew in 21...Smooth as glass, especially if you do some other things to improve it's comfort. If not it's still beautiful, but if you do it, the corkscrew element can be as smooth as Rougarou.

Serious.

Just a thought, Would it be possible to retrofit some sort of suspension on Mean Streak's cars?

^^ what do you mean ride corkscrew on 21?

^ Ride op speak. It is 2nd car 1st row. thedevaririouseffect, do you have a preference between load or unload side?