Retractable Seat Belts

Mean Streak,Corkscrew,and Blue Streak,now have retractable seat belts,This is great news,Was sooo tiring fighting those belts being twisty and tangly everytime,good move Cedar Point!

The only one it was an issue on was Corkscrew. I didn't think the belts were a problem on the others. I will say, after riding Beast last summer, the retractable was nice, but I didn't think the change was worth it for MS and BS.

I think that the seat belts will help dispatch time because the ride host don't have to wait for the fat people like me who have hard time with the seat belt. I have been to Kings Island and the retractables are nice. Double Loop at GL had them last year and it was nicer then Corkscrews, which I got a feeling that is where they got them from for two of the trains.

I love hearing about people struggling with seatbelts, since you know, they're super complicated.

I am really happy to see retractable seat belts on all three of them. Hopefully it will help out dispatch time on all of them. I am glad corckscrew finally got them I was sick of them hitting my head.

I always get a kick out of the George Carlin routine about airline announcements about seat belts.

"Take the seat belt and place the the small metal flap into the buckle."

"I ask for clarification at that point. Yes, over her, thank you. Did you say place the small metal flap into the buckle? OR, place the buckle over and around the small metal flap? I am a simple man I do not possess an engineering degree nor am I mechanically inclined."

Kills me every time!

^^^Its not that we have trouble buckling because we dont know how. The trouble is that the male end is so ridiculously short that its hard to reach around and find it, get a hold of it, and buckle. This was especially true on the Blue Streak when I saw many a normal people having an issue with buckling.

I wasn't making fun of anyone for having trouble, it's just that this discussion immediately brought that routine to my mind.

I have also had trouble sometimes because the people that just got out are so considerate and leave the ends either wedged in the seat or whatever.

JuggaLotus said:
...I didn't think the change was worth it for MS and BS.

You've never operated a ride with the old-style seatbelts, then. Otherwise you'd know that the retractables are going to eliminate the majority of "complications" guests run in to:

- sitting on the belt, not realizing it's even there and then pulling down and locking their lapbar
- the belt doubleing up on itself and getting jammed, holding up the train to get it straightened out

Not to mention ride ops won't have to waste time buckling the empty seats. Seems worth it to me.

I agree that they will be helpful. They shouldn't have to buckle the empties for one thing and a simple visual check should now suffice instead of actually having to tug each one. Doesn't seem like much, but things moved quicker before they required us to tug the seatbelts too. It was a one handed operation instead of two. I could use my right hand on one row and my left on the next, etc. You could do a whole side of the train in like 8 seconds! :)

Do you have to wear your belt on these rides?

Yes, seatbelts must be worn on any ride that provides them.

Yes you must keep the seatbelts buckled. On Raptor if one of us spots an unbuckled seatbelt on the lift we have to stop the lift. Which causes an inconvenience for not just everyone in the train but everyone waiting in line, because it takes a little before the ride is started up again.

^^^I was shocked when I read that question....but I have heard weirder questions.

TTD Man said:
Yes you must keep the seatbelts buckled. On Raptor if one of us spots an unbuckled seatbelt on the lift we have to stop the lift. Which causes an inconvenience for not just everyone in the train but everyone waiting in line, because it takes a little before the ride is started up again.

Yes..i have seen that happen before..this guy in front of us on Raptor decided it was a good idea to unbuckle his seat belt and well it wasnt and the whole ride stopped on the lift...thats one think i love about CP..you always safe of their rides :)

Touchdown said:
^^^Its not that we have trouble buckling because we dont know how. The trouble is that the male end is so ridiculously short that its hard to reach around and find it, get a hold of it, and buckle. This was especially true on the Blue Streak when I saw many a normal people having an issue with buckling.

I know I was just joking around. Its just funny hearing people complain about something like that because out of context it makes them look pretty stupid.

^ That happened once when I was waiting in line at MF. Someone decided to unbuckle their seat belt when the train was about 200 feet up the lift hill. The ride locked down and couldn't move until a ride engineer traveled up to the train in the elevator cart and inspected ever single rider's seat belt.

The whole process took about a half hour. So I hope everyone has learned a lesson here.

It looks like the lightening bolt decals on the side of Mean Streak's 

trains have been removed:

http://www.cedarpoint.com/public/fun/blog/index.cfm?entry=9aa2255b-7932-40e2-9399-3500821e3583

Looks better anyway, they were really pealing off badly.

^ Or possibly not applied yet. It looks as if the decal on the front of the train is brand new. They may not have gotten around to applying them yet. Anyone remember a few years ago when MF opened with no decals on the front of the train? It looked pretty weird without them.

The only thing about retractable seatbelts is their tendency to get stuck at times. Whenever I worked at Hurler down at Carowinds, the retractable seatbelts they had on there used to lock up and get stuck constantly. I don't know if it was just the design or the trains or what, but they can get a little tedious sometimes.