Top Hat Stall... what are the odds?

Heard through the grapevine that our new Intamin toy stalled in early "full blast" testing at the peak of the ride. Honestly now, isn't that nearly impossible? It's like balancing a spoon on a toothpick. Anywho, maybe someone else can confirm this feat (Apparently it was test #100). On a related note, I wonder how they got it down, or whether a gust of wind eventually blew it down.

(Edit: Just for clarification, supposedly the train stopped, yes stopped at the peak of the ride not because anything broke or got lodged in the track, but simply because the train didn't have enough energy to continue rolling over the tophat.)

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Jes
Jes's Roller Coasters DJ Jes
Six Flags Worlds Of Adventure Ride-Ops Crew 2002-2003! Have fun trying to find me!
*** This post was edited by Zero-G 4/24/2003 6:56:15 AM ***

I brought this up a while back, and everyone laughed at me.

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magnum count: 2233
www.dannyjphoto.com

In the testing I saw yesterday it either rolled-back (possibly on purpose) or it barely made it over the top. You could have sat there and watched and made bets to see if it would make it over once on the tophat. It was cool to see.

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Just the track, the wind, and the speed.

Yes, the train did "STOP" at the top of the top-hat. Someone MIGHT have said something like, "I couldn't get that to happen again if I wanted to." It just so happened that the train was launched with just the RIGHT amount of power to get it up there, and not go all the way over, it was, like zero-g said, 'perfectly balanced.' Anyhow, the 'odds' are 'not good' for it to ever happen again since it will generally be launched at the correct power levels.

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Phoebe: Hi!
Rachel: Hi! I just want to apologize. I’m really sorry I was a baby.
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Rachel: Yeah.

Dan said:
I brought this up a while back, and everyone laughed at me.
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magnum count: 2233
www.dannyjphoto.com

Dan I also said it was possible to do that awhile back and everyone on here said that it wasn't possible.

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Speed Freaks - 2003

1 day until I process in.

So the crest is a perfect curve so that the train COULD balance up there? I thought maybe the engineers would design a curve like that with a very minor imbalance, minor enough so you wouldn't notice, but just enough to prevent something like that.

I would think that depending on the load in the train,the launch would have to have different powers in order to get the train to do the speed they want it to over the tophat. I mean,is there some sort of weigh system like on Power Tower or something? There could be a load of riders on physics that that is mostly eighth graders that is 20% lighter than a load of adults,causing more speed over the top than they want it to have. Or is it just a full launch every time sort of thing with power to get even the heaviest load over?

They won't weight the trains it will have a full launch as you put it.

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Speed Freaks - 2003

1 day until I process in.

The weight of the riders - regardless of who they are - isn't significant when compared to the weight of the train.

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Virtual Midway
http://www.virtualmidway.com

wathing the videos posted yesterday it looks like it might be a possibility of the train stalling on the top hat

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Cedar Po!nt Rocks My Socks

Would you guys lay off the crack for just a moment, please? I'll give you a better analogy. It's like trying to balance a Toyota on a toothpick. The thing is on wheels, kiddies. Things on wheels tend to roll.

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Jeff
Webmaster/GTTP - Sillynonsense.com
"Pray that your country undergoes recovery!" - KMFDM

Objects at rest remain at rest unless acted on by an external force. Regardless of wheels. Objects in motion also will remain in motion unless acted on by an external force ( gravity, wind resistance, friction). Or maybe im just on crack.

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Just can't live in that negative way... Make way for the positive Day

realmadrid311 said:
Objects at rest remain at rest unless acted on by an external force. Regardless of wheels. Objects in motion also will remain in motion unless acted on by an external force ( gravity, wind resistance, friction). Or maybe im just on crack.

You're right. And it sure doesn't sound like you're on crack...

And if it did stall at the top, a few maintenance workers would ride the elevator to the top and push the train over the crest. No big deal.

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Florida may have Disneyworld and Key West,
but Ohio has Cedar Point and Put-In-Bay.
It's great to live in Ohio!

Wow...such a high tech machine we have here. I can see it now "Here at Cedar Point we hand-push our newest rides over the hills".

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Michael McCormack
Magnum Count: 632

A swift kick of the foot to the train should do the job just fine ;)

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James Draeger
-Captain Sarcasm

It is absolutely possible for the train to balance at the top of the tophat; it is just extremely unlikely. For the train to simply balance, all you have to do is have forces pulling each end of the train to be close enough to equal that the sum is smaller than the static friction in the wheels (bearings and wheel surface on track). In other words, there is a slight amount of imbalance that the frictional forces on the stopped train would be able to overcome, so the train would stay in place. If one were to 'place' the train in this position, it would be much easier than 'balancing a Toyota on a toothpick,' a situation with virtually no retarding forces.

The real difficulty comes into play here when you realize that in launching the train to this position, one of two things need to happen to stop the train on top. First, if the center of gravity of the train never actually reaches the peak of the tophat, it must have just enough energy to stop in that small length of track on the launch side where static friction will overcome the force of gravity that is pulling the train back down the launch (I would guess this window could be a few inches or a foot, but is probably less). The second possiblily is that the c.g. of the train does go over peak of the tophat, but the train has so little kinetic energy left that the frictional losses in the wheel bearings stop the train on that small length of track on the drop side where the train would sit in equilibrium. Only the frictional losses that occur within that small window would come into play here, and since rolling friction is much smaller that static friction, the likelyhood of this happening is even smaller that the first situation above.

Keep in mind that unusual circumstances like wind gusts and so forth could also be factors, but that does not change the fact that the train stopping on top would be extremely unlikely. Also the shape of the track on the tophat would have some effect on the size of the 'stopping window,' but it could not be completely eliminated.

The train did stop at the top, a maintenance worker rode the elevator to the top and pushed it forward.

I guess it's a good thing they do testing then.

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and remember, if you can't be an athlete, be an athletic supporter

You could just get everyone on the train to rock back and forth untill it breaks loose. I'd tell everyone to go back first so we can ride it again. :)

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-Mike

The Fast and the Fearless