What should Cedar Point do to improve the mean Streak or should they just give up?

The retracking of RWB took three years. It began after the season ended in 2002, with the second third being done during the 2003-2004 off-season. Cedar Fair bought the park in that year, and themselves finished the retracking before the 2005 season started.

And boy, what a difference it made. That coaster went from 'destroy your internal organs' to 'butter smooth'. It's my lasting regret I wasn't able to get my daughter on it. The ride closed after the accident in June 2007; however, she didn't hit the requisite 48" until August of that year. So she just missed it.

The layout of the ride isn't what tears the riders apart

Maybe, maybe not, but it is what is wrong with the ride. Hence, the brake on the first drop, which kills the ride. Retracking MS every day next season before it opens would not fix what is wrong with it.

Kevinj said:
Maybe, maybe not, but it is what is wrong with the ride. Hence, the brake on the first drop, which kills the ride. Retracking MS every day next season before it opens would not fix what is wrong with it.

Thats not layout. Thats the profile of the hills and turns. If you build a ride in a figure 8 pattern with crappy rails, you blame the rails. Not the layout.

The profiles of the hills and turns doesn't count as the layout? The ride was simply poorly designed...structurally flawed. The brake isn't on the first hill because of the ride being rough, it's there because the ride was ripping itself apart. Now the thing is just boring from start to finish.

I gave it a try every year up until last year, always hoping for the best, when I finally decided enough is enough. I do, however, feel lucky I rode it when it first opened, as it was a crazy ride without the first drop brake.

Kevinj said:
The profiles of the hills and turns doesn't count as the layout?

Nope. Those would be elements.

Ensign Smith said:But didn't you see that episode of Seinfeld? "No Intamin pre-fab for you!"

Didn't Kinzel or Monty make a guest star in that episode? ;)

^ Yes. They were both in it. They played the ambiguously gay thugs that roughed up Kramer.

Once again, thank you PrawoJazdy. So Kevinj, let me get this straight. You mean to tell me that the engineers at Dinn Corporation poorly designed Mean Streak's layout and that is why they had to add trim brakes, resulting in jolting riders around? What about Mantis' trims on the first hill? What about Magnum's trims b4 the pretzel loop? Or the re-profile they had to do on Magnum after it's opening?

If Mean Streak's layout was the problem, don't you think Dinn and/or Cedar Point would have decided to re-profile portions of the ride by now? It's not the layout as Prawo has said, it's the rails.

CP did reprofile major portions of the ride, within several years after opening (the exact date escapes me). In conjunction with adding the first drop trim, they lowered the second hill so that the now slower trains could pass without valleying, and they reduced the angle of a number of banked turns so these trains (again, slower) wouldn't ride right on the lower rail. This has all been posted about a number of times. If I'm getting any of these details wrong, mea culpa.

You mean to tell me that the engineers at Dinn Corporation poorly designed Mean Streak's layout and that is why they had to add trim brakes, resulting in jolting riders around?

Yup.

PrawoJazdy said:

Kevinj said:
The profiles of the hills and turns doesn't count as the layout?

Nope. Those would be elements.

And a series of elements linked together is a layout.

This topic is probably the most recurring of any on this forum. ;) Here is some good reading for those of you who weren't here for the past discussions.

http://pointbuzz.com/Forums/Thread/24073.aspx?page=2#387661

And a series of elements linked together is a layout.

Very good.

However, what is specifically being talked about is the elements.

Lets explain so you understand a bit better. If you have a figure 8 layout (ie: Gemini) and build 2 coasters in that figure 8 layout, one with wood rails and the other with steel and the wood one is rough, while the steel is smooth, do you still blame the layout?

A hill is an element, a turn is an element. correct that when all put together they create a layout, but you don't blame the layout of the coaster for piss poor element design that creates a shaky ride.

Holy semantics, Batman.

The point is that the extent of the work being done on Mean Streak is not unprecedented. For all we know, they're simply doing a larger quantity of their annual maintenance.

Which, in turn, will not make MS any better. Although since we are trying to be clear, allow me to elaborate.

My problem with MS has nothing to do with roughness. In fact, I do not find it rough like may people do. My problem with MS is it feels so painfully slow, and there is no airtime left. When it first opened, it felt fast and wild...this is pre first drop brake and pre reprofiling of part of the ride.

The ride is structurally flawed. When I say layout, I do not mean a pattern (figure 8) or elements, I am talking about the ride as a whole. It's crap, just like Hercules was at Dorney Park (same company, equal crap). If it was not structurally flawed, the first drop brake never would have been installed, because it would not be tearing itself apart without it. It was, so they needed to slow the ride way down, which fixed the maintenance nightmare that was built, but left us with a slow, boring pile of wood that is pretty to look at.

You can re-track the whole damn thing every day, but that will not take away the first drop brake. Will it make for a smoother ride? Maybe, but that is not what is wrong with MS. It's been neutered. The lack of speed (or even perceived speed) is what is wrong with MS, so if they can figure out a way to bring that back, I will ride it again.

djDaemon said:
Holy semantics, Batman.

The point is that the extent of the work being done on Mean Streak is not unprecedented. For all we know, they're simply doing a larger quantity of their annual maintenance.

Says the guy who loves semantics.

So they've closed the ride early in the season before? When?

I get that you're trying to bait an argument. I'm not biting.

Nope. I'm just curious as to when Cedar Point closed Mean Streak early in the season to do maintenance.

A hill is an element, a turn is an element. correct that when all put together they create a layout, but you don't blame the layout of the coaster for piss poor element design that creates a shaky ride.

You do if the elements are poorly sequenced. And because of the way the elements of Mean Streak are compiled together, a trim brake was needed on the first drop to keep it from ripping itself apart. As a result, the ride shuffles the entire way through because it isn't allowed to run fast enough to properly execute the layout. No amount of track replacement is going to fix the fundamental flaw in the ride.

PrawoJazdy said:
Nope. I'm just curious as to when Cedar Point closed Mean Streak early in the season to do maintenance.

They haven't.

However, that doesn't mean they are doing anything extraordinary. Every year, they replace sections of track and lumber. It is likely, that this year, they are replacing more track than typical.

It's not anything different than they have done in the past, just in a larger quantity. And since it is not any different, it's not going to have any appreciable affect on how crappy the ride currently runs.