Shoot the Rapids Down For July 4th

I got to the park yesterday around 5 p.m., and a boat was stopped on the first lift, and all water effects had been turned off on Shoot the Rapids. After an hour of waiting, the boat starting making it's way back up the first lift, and all of the water effects were operating. After a few test runs, it stopped once again. After yet another hour, the ride turned back to life, and made many test runs. As they got the phone call at the front of the queue to open back up, what happens? It stops once again. After this, I got out of line to go ride Gemini. When I passed Shoot the Rapids around 9 p.m., the gift and photo store was closed are dark, and mechanics were roaming around the station.

So... does anyone know what's up with that?

It was operating with no line at 11:00 PM last night, I walked right on. You must have been unlucky. Remember, this is a new ride and there are bound to be hiccups.

We rode it last night 3 times in a half hour.

The park was slammed, and the ride was a walk on. Not to mention it was in the 90's yesterday and in the mid 80's last night.

If the ride was down mechanical, but opened later and the park thought it could get it up and running before close, Why close the gift shop?

WaterDummy said:
Remember, this is a new ride and there are bound to be hiccups.

Some "hiccups" are understandable, but Shoot the Rapids has hiccuping for nearly two months now on a ride type that's been around since the 1960s. I'm not sure if I'd call that hiccups or total organ failure.

Gotta side with Tim:

1) This is not new technology
2) It was the boats that weren't ready for Opening Day, everything else has been "ready" since April. The extra month should have given them time to work out the "hiccups."

It seemed to be operating well last night. I got on it three times between 12:45am and 1:00am. Although I was in Soak City for much of the day and from the top of the slide towers I could see exactly what you are talking about. Boats seemed to be stuck on top of the hills for the majority of the day. Looking at the webcam now, it seems to be having the same problem...

I don't totally get why it's having so many issues but it's a good ride so I guess I can cut it some slack. ;)

Were the other however many rides CP has nowadays closed too?

I, like Captain Hawkeye, have to side with Tim. Those extra two months should have been plenty of time to work out all of those problems.

I rode it just before it broke down for the evening(around 2-230),it broke down when i was waiting but luckly only down for maybe 20 mins

How do you work out problems when you don't have the opportunity to test because the boats were the wrong size?

The boats are still the wrong size.They have the back rows roped off, and permanent looking signes in the back seats saying that this row is closed.

It's been 2 weeks now since the "new" boats have been in the water. We are now 51 days into the season, and the ride has not ran for more than a few hours at a time. Even the people that have been on the ride give it mixed reviews.

We are not even sure if it is the boats that are giving them a problem "this" time.

Looking at the webcam right now, the ride looks like a ghost town. I have not seen a boat go by all day.

So yea.......EPIC FAIL!!!

Ben is right. It's not like they could test it while they were waiting for new boats. So these problems couldn't have been prevented. You guys need to starting thinking a little more realistically. And I'm but Tim is slightly wrong because this IS a new type of ride. The idea has been around from the 1960 yea maybe. But I dont know many flume rides that have flumes made entirely out of concrete. Most consist of fiberglass flumes or which STR has none. Also, the chain lift system is still new to this boat type.

TTD 120mph said:
Ben is right. It's not like they could test it while they were waiting for new boats. So these problems couldn't have been prevented. You guys need to starting thinking a little more realistically. And I'm but Tim is slightly wrong because this IS a new type of ride. The idea has been around from the 1960 yea maybe. But I dont know many flume rides that have flumes made entirely out of concrete. Most consist of fiberglass flumes or which STR has none. Also, the chain lift system is still new to this boat type.

Here is a lift for a boat of this type that has been around for quite a while with very few issues if any....

http://rcdb.com/1904.htm?p=0

If a flume ride has a concrere flume, or fiberglass, should not make any differance at all.

Splash Mountain uses a concrete trough and a chain lift on an eight-person "log" at the Magic Kingdom. I'm not sure who the manufacturer was for any of the Splash Mountain installations.

While Pilgrims Plunge and Shoot the Rapids are technically new variations of an old idea, I'm not sure that entirely excuses the delays/issues. Haven't those at Intamin themselves been making water/flume rides for decades now? Were the "innovations" on this newest generation really necessary? Somebody feels that there was room for improvement it seems. From the outside it is difficult to tell what apparent benefits (lower maintenance, better capacity, etc.) these changes have over the relatively time-tested stuff that's worked on flume rides for years. The new generation of Intamin flumes does seem like over-thinking/over-engineering response to "problems" that weren't necessarily problems.

When we were filming the STR commercial on Wednesday the ride experienced choppy downtime throughout the day. The blocking system seems to be faulty and the ramps to the hills seem to be a little off. We got stuck on the ramp to the first hill for 30 minutes and it was very boring. they have a few operational kinks to work out, but it should be good by midseason. TTD runs perfectly now and remember 2003/4. It was rough.

crazy horse said:Here is a lift for a boat of this type that has been around for quite a while with very few issues if any....If a flume ride has a concrere flume, or fiberglass, should not make any differance at all.

I should have specified more as I meant for Intamin. STR is the first of it's kind for Intamin. It's the first of it's kind to implement this lift design, and only 2nd with this boat design. Though the boats are still slightly different compared to Pilgrims Plunge since it uses an elevator lift system. Plus I was also getting at how the older style flume rides use belt lifts.

Also, my reference to the flumes was comparing how flume rides were built in the 60's as apposed to now. And there is still a difference anyway when you look at costs and maintenance.

And since everyone seems to get caught up in how well the older style worked compared to how STR is working, you're still missing the fact that this is an Intamin ride. Sure Intamin has made a lot of regular flumes but it's keeping the tradition of redesigning on an old design. STR uses a blocking system similar to Maverick and I'm sure that's been one of the major problems so far. So stop looking at STR as an old style ride and comparing it to them. How it operates is still far from the flumes of old days.

Newer doesn't always mean better. This ride seems to illustrate that point perfectly.

That's the problem.

They are trying to fix something that is not broke.

Why would you try to reinvent something that has worked just fine for years. The old school log flumes, or the more recent mack water rides have worked just fine.

You don't need pumps in the boats, you don't need blocks except on drops, you just don't need a flume ride to be as advanced as shoot the rapids is. Other versions/ types of this kind of ride have worked just fine.

With the exception of maintanance cost's in the long run, having a cement flume or a fiberglass flume, makes no differance. It would have nothing to do with the ride having the issues it is having today. And if it did, it would be cheaper for them to rebuild a section of fiberglass than it would be a cement section. But this is not the case, so it don't matter.

I give intamin props for pushing the envelope, but is this necessary? And if so, how is it working out for them?

I wonder if cedar point can take advantage of the lemon law in this case?:)

Leave it to Intamin to take a simple technology that works and turn it into a complex technology that doesn't.