The good and the bad

Thanks to those who answered my question. I'll wait til they contact me then I can decide how to revise my vacation that I already had planned out for other SF parks.

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Loyal Mean Streak fan 4ever:)

Yea...I meant the overhaul with seat dividers and individual lap bars, and headrests (did that all come at once?). What was the 2002 overhaul? Either way, I want those Big Dipper trains to stay untouched!

I actually rode Big Dipper at the old Geauga Lake BEFORE I was born! My mother didn't know yet that she was pregnant with me, and she rode the Big Dipper 21 times in a row. Maybe that's why I grew up loving roller coasters!!! I agree also...leave the trains untouched.

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Loyal Mean Streak fan 4ever:)

Not only do the trains need to stay the way they are but so does the rest of the ride. To be specific I am refering to the brake system and ride controls. The friction pads that are used are much smother than air brakes like the ones on Blue Streak. Plus they look cool with the big control handles.

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Cedar Point Googlism

Mozilla may have taken two years to reach v1.0, but it is more stable and secure than IE will ever be.

Yes, and those manual brakes put more reliance on ride operators to keep you safe, and it's precisely the reason running more than one train has resulted in various low-speed crashes over the years.

Nostalgia isn't going to keep you safe.

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Jeff - Webmaster - GTTP - My Blog
Blogs, photo albums - CampusFish
What time does the water show start?

Actually, I am pretty sure the ride is computer controlled now. You can see prox sensors along the track in the station, and I don't think the brakes can be applied manually.

Maybe this is one good thing SF did with the ride.

-Sam

EDIT: Typo
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Avalanche Run - My first Roller Coaster.
Magnum XL-200 - The BEST Roller Coaster!
*** This post was edited by Avalanche Sam 3/15/2004 10:20:10 AM ***

I like nostalgia as much as the next guy but for a few personal reasons I am a huge proponent of putting automatic braking on the Dipper. It should have been done after the first accident...wasn't...and then should have been done after the second accident.

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"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world...but it requires people to make the dreams a reality."

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Monster Ride Op said:
Not only do the trains need to stay the way they are but so does the rest of the ride. To be specific I am refering to the brake system and ride controls. The friction pads that are used are much smother than air brakes like the ones on Blue Streak. Plus they look cool with the big control handles.

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(here we go again...)

You guys don't make it to Geauga Lake much, do you? The braking on Big Dipper has been computer controlled for at least two seasons now! Still the same old skid brakes, and with the spring-loaded couplers on the train, it does a lot of bouncing and banging as it moves through the station because the system designer has it 'goosing' the brakes as the train moves from unload to load. Cool thing they did...the old control handles are still there, just permanently mounted on the platform. (I would have used the old levers to operate switches to run the computer, but that's just me...).

I wasn't aware of a collision accident on Big Dipper that involved more than one train; I just know of the one where the coupler spring broke and allowed two cars (of the same train, still coupled) to crash into one another on the brake run.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Well, no more huffing for me. I thought they had been automated but then when others said they weren't I second guessed myself.

Both accidents on the Dipper happened in the 80's. 1988 and 1989 if memory serves but I may not be exactly right. In both cases train A didn't make it out of the loading position and train B came in, wasn't stopped and slammed into the back of A. The reasons differed in both cases.

While these might have been considered "low speed" crashes, both caused significant damage and injury. No deaths.

It still took them another 8-10 years to do something if your dates are accurate Dave which I think was ridiculous.

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"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world...but it requires people to make the dreams a reality."

( just caught this in another part of the thread)

Updates to the Blue Streak at CP:

1994: Platform redesigned, computer installed, squeeze brakes installed.

1995: New lap bars (black) installed on Car #1 of Train #1. Remember, all the other lap bars were yellow.

1996: Trains retrofitted with headrests, seat dividers and ratcheting lap bars.

2000: Lap bars/ratchet mechanisms replaced. Not sure; this may also be when the individual seat belts appeared.

2002: Mysterious structural wizardry performed (along with some paint) which caused the ride to run smoother and faster than it had run in years.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

They must have changed since I was there last, which was during the SFO season. Sorry about the big rukas that I started with my earlier post. It's not that I don't like computer controlled system, I just don't like how they did it on Blue Streak. And when I did go to SFO I found that I liked the old system on BD better than the one on BS. Of course they were only running one train that day so I didn't even think about the consequences that a two train operation would have on the system.

Interesting data on BS Rideman. Now I wish that I had ridden BS when I went to CP during the years prior to '94. Unfortuanitly, I didn't like riding coasters until '99.

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Cedar Point Googlism

Mozilla may have taken two years to reach v1.0, but it is more stable and secure than IE will ever be.

Quick correction to Dave's Blue Streak timeline...

* 2000 Bonus Weekends: New parking/staging system put-in. Lap Bars were still the same as 1996 (damn springs!)
* 2001: New double-ratcheting lap-bars installed
* Different parts of the ride were rebuilt/retracked from winter 2000 to spring 2002

I miss the old hand-brakes from when I first rode it in '92. I wish I could have worked on it then. But no, I was 'lucky' enough to be on the '96 crew with the crappy PTC lapbars. (The current ones are so much better.) 2000 was a good summer to be TL on that ride, too. -- I miss my Blue Streak.

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'95-2001 Ride Op./ 2001-2003 Env.Services Sup.
2003 Soak City East Lifeguard / Fright Zone TL
2004 RipCord TL (& eXtreme Trampoline!)

Higbie, if you're going to get that detailed with it, you might also mention...

Late summer 1994: Block timing reset (allow train 2 into station once brakes are clear instead of requiring train 1 to get halfway up the lift first)

For 1995 season: Added a bunch more brake calipers to the station approach in order to reduce the "Toothchipper Effect"

--Dave Althoff, Jr.