Why not another Magnum block?

It seems to me that another block could easily be added to Maggie between the tunnel brakes and the brakes just outside the station. This would keep setups from ever being a problem.

My question is why was Magnum only designed with 4 blocks instead of 5 when another could have so easily been added?

Was it to force the crews to hit interval and therfore get such high capacity or was it an oversite by Arrow and Cedar Point?

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Welcome back Magnum riders how was your ride?

There are two reasons I can think of. It would be impractical to have three sets of brakes right before a station. Adding the extra brakes would only add a few seconds to their dispatch interval and I think CP would rather set up once or twice a day then spend the money to build and maintain an unnecessary set of brakes. Also you have to realize that most Arrow coasters use good old fashioned gravity to move trains, instead of wheels like on new coasters. As you probably know, the way the track turns back into the station, it goes downhill then up a little bit. If they added brakes and the the train were to stop, there would be no momentum to get it back up that incline in into the next set of brakes.

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Brent Haley
Gemini Crew '02

There are plenty of blocks already, they just need to re-wire the ride so that you don't have to send someone out to the block to manually release the train. To this day I don't understand why it has to be run that way, but the benefit is that at least it forces interval.

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Jeff
Webmaster/GTTP - Sillynonsense.com
"Climbing as we fall, we dare to hold on to our fate, and steal away our destiny to catch ourselves with quiet grace" - The Stairs, INXS

I'm still wondering if Magnum's station was supposed to go over the midway where the long straight section of track is immedately after the station. And if another block was supposed to be where the station is now.

Something interesting to think about...

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"Proud to be Arrow DYNAMIC!"

Hey Jeff what do you mean that they have to send someone out to the block to manually release the train? I'm sorry if that is a stupid question but i'm totally confused right now.

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Someone help me i'm in denial about Project 2003.

If the block that includes the transfer has a train in it, which would happen because the station isn't clear, then the incoming train gets stopped dead at the safety block, next to the base of the lift. When they dispatch the train in the station, and the train in the transfer moves into the station, they have to send someone physically out to the safeties to release that train.

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Jeff
Webmaster/GTTP - Sillynonsense.com
"Climbing as we fall, we dare to hold on to our fate, and steal away our destiny to catch ourselves with quiet grace" - The Stairs, INXS

Actually that maes more sense Jeff. If the safety block was basically a regular block they would never have a problem setting up.

The train would stop on the lift and just as easily be restarted. And no one would have to run out and release the train on the safety block. For all intents and purposes the saety block is a Midcourse. On any other ride a train stopped at the midcourse is realeased on its own. Why is Maggie so different?

I don't know about the station out there Rob. Why is there such a drop down if that were the case?

On thing I have always thought about is what would the ending be like if there were no safety block in it's current location. To come screaming down and around into the brakes before the station woudl be pretty cool.

And wouldn's an extra blcok in front of the station make putting Maggie to bed at night a lot easier?

Regardless why didn't Arrow and Cedar Point think about this to begin with? It seems like common sense.

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Thats right Virginia, I am Santa Claus.

*** This post was edited by Magnum Force 12/4/2002 4:54:02 PM ***
*** This post was edited by Magnum Force 12/4/2002 5:00:42 PM ***

By going out and physically resetting it yourself you're also making sure everything and everyone is okay out there. It's a little safer, in my opinion, to have somebody run out there and look at everything close up.

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- John
*I resign from the game of life if I have to play with stupidity.
*I'll make it easy for you- "Shut up Michael Darling, I disagree with you." Now you don't have to say it anymore! :)

But is it really any different from being at the end of Raptor's brake run, or the brakes before the turn on Mantis (back in three-train operation)? It's not, that's why I don't get the reasoning.

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Jeff
Webmaster/GTTP - Sillynonsense.com
"Climbing as we fall, we dare to hold on to our fate, and steal away our destiny to catch ourselves with quiet grace" - The Stairs, INXS

...and Michael Darling gets today's gold star.

All of Magnum's blocks are visible from the doghouse, but that's the only thing that makes Magnum's setup unusual. In general, you don't want to restart a train if you can't see what is going on at the train's location.

Of course, why does Magnum set up on a station cascade anyway? There's no real reason it would have to; why shouldn't it self-reset? I wonder if CP set it up the way they did on purpose to force crews to meet interval... :)

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Jeff, here's my thoughts on that:

People have a knack for freaking out when they don't understand what's going on. I can't tell you how many times I've been on a ride that has stopped for whatever reason and had the people behind me freak out because they thought the train was going to spontaniously combust or what not (as I'm sure you've encountered before yourself). Every now and then there is bound to be somebody who tries to get out of the train to escape their ever-so-certain doom.

While it's almost impossible to escape from the restraints on Mantis or Raptor, it's not really all that hard to slip out from under the bar on an Arrow minetrain, especially in a panic. The difference that I see between your two scenarios (Raptor/Mantis vs. Magnum) is if somebody is trying to escape their "doom" on either B&M they can't get out, while on Magnum they could at least partially get out of the train. If said train starts moving while Mr. Joe Bubba has his leg dangling out of the train... well you get the picture.

Just my thoughts.

And Rideman, thanks for the star. I will wear it proudly!

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- John
*I'll make it easy for you- "Shut up Michael Darling, I disagree with you." Now you don't have to say it anymore! :)

But if that were the case am extar block would keep a train from ever having to be stuck on the lift hill. The spot where more people freak out when a train stops then anyplace else.

John, I could get out of Maggie's train at the transfer block if I wanted too. I think anyone could if they tried hard enough.

If I were the designers, going out and checking the peeps on the safety block would be teh least of my worries, I would be more worried about those stuck on the lift.

As for forcing interval I hypothesized that in the first place but shouldn't safety be above capacity?

Aren't you off a lot safer if you have two blocks sitting right there outside the station in case something were to happen.

Thats is exactly why I had a maggie walkdown once. The train would not leave the safety block and I had to walk down off the lift. That was about 1993 or 94.

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Thats right Virginia, I am Santa Claus.

*** This post was edited by Magnum Force 12/4/2002 11:13:00 PM ***
*** This post was edited by Magnum Force 12/5/2002 2:09:10 AM ***

from working on maggie i know that it is impossible to add a swtich in the controls for the safetys becuase it is part of the safty system. when you have two people you can be more safe than with only one person controling the breaks

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Matt Fown
2002 Magnum / Camp Snoopy Crews
*** This post was edited by cpfreak2 12/6/2002 1:32:59 AM ***

OK If I understood what you said there....it would make sense. How about trying again in English this time? ;)

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Thats right Virginia, I am Santa Claus.

*** This post was edited by Magnum Force 12/5/2002 12:09:54 AM ***

I think what he's trying to say is that as it is right now, it requires two people to either release the safties or start the lift on Magnum: one person in controls pulling up on a button and another one out at the lift or safeties turing a key.

My best guesses as to why they have things set up in such a manual way are as follows. First is that in the event of a set up (stackage), the train comes to a fairly abrupt stop on the safeties. Because of this, park ops and maintenance want to know how often this is happening. Secondly, and it sort of goes along with the first in a safety sense and also for capacity reasons, is they want to force the crew to hit interval. I disagree with anyone who thinks forcing a crew to hit interval makes anything less safe. No one is going to send a train before it's ready for the sake of interval. Having things this way just adds a little bit of necessary urgency to the platform operations! ;)

-Matt
2001 Magnum Crew
*** This post was edited by MDOmnis 12/5/2002 9:54:15 AM ***

Fair enough.

Thanks for the translation Matt.

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Thats right Virginia, I am Santa Claus.

I'll buy your two reasons, Matt, but I can't even read what the other Matt wrote so I disagree with him. Besides, I think he fails to see that control systems can indeed be re-worked, as Magnum was last year (and Mine Ride before it).

I still think that there isn't a good reason to run it that way. The control system could easily be programmed to log setups, so maintenance could know about them. On the other hand, if it forces interval, keep it up!

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Jeff
Webmaster/GTTP - Sillynonsense.com
"Climbing as we fall, we dare to hold on to our fate, and steal away our destiny to catch ourselves with quiet grace" - The Stairs, INXS

To see why the threat of a setup is good for capacity, just look at Blue Streak. When the ride had skid brakes, the crew worked like a fine swiss watch getting the trains out on time. They had too, but safety wasn't comprimised. Now, they hardly ever hit interval. I often see a somewhat leisurly walk down the platform checking restriants, while the other train is sitting on the brakes outside the station. There is no sense of urgency. If anything, I feel this creates boredom and could make operations less safe (though I doubt it does, I'm not insulting the crew).

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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!

Well having worked Millennium Force during Halloweekends, I can say that not having to worry about intervals whatsoever does give you the idea that you can take as long as you want. Going from Gemini to Millennium Force was a huge switch for me because everything just seemed so laid-back.

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Brent Haley
Gemini Crew '02

I totally agree with that statement about them not pushing to get the trains through. The last time I was there, it was ridiculous how long it took them to move the trains. They had had enough people at the ride to run three, which would have pushed them to go faster, instead they went ahead and ran two trains, not even trying to go fast at all. I was pretty pissed because it was like SF efficiency. It took like 7 minutes for them to send out a train and load the next.

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Launch: Tophat: Twistage: Brakes...

...Denial is an ugly thing.