work going on at top of lift hill

been watching FunCoast and notice some work going on, at top of lift hill, what do you think it is? seen the service cart go up the hill and two men getting stuff from it, they walked about ten times from the top down to cart getting stuff.
*** Edited 3/29/2005 4:22:24 PM UTC by backhoe***

Rides don't just maintain themselves. Why is it any big surprise that there are people all over every ride this time of year?

I thought the rides were maintained by gnomes when noone was looking.

I'm just watching away on funcoast. Someone else is controlling it for me.

If you look closely at the track, you will notice dates. Every bolt gets torqued and a date is placed next to the joint of the date the inspection was made. They are in March, there is one for 01 02 03 04 and now 05.

The lift hill is probably the last done because it's dangerous up there if it's wet or icy. Protective gear will only prevent you from falling off of the structure, If you slip and fall up there, you could easily be injured. It doesn't take much of an injury to make getting down very difficult.

There are massive amounts of work that need to be done over the next month before the park can open. Landscaping, cleanup, setup, inspections, rebuilds, budget cuts, and ride cycling just to name a few.

The park is coming out of hibernation at this time. Around 100,000 man hours will go into getting the park ready from now untill opening day.

ForgottenEE said:
If you look closely at the track, you will notice dates. Every bolt gets torqued and a date is placed next to the joint of the date the inspection was made. They are in March, there is one for 01 02 03 04 and now 05.

How in the hell can you see this?

Benji, You must be young not to notice when someone is ripping on everyone. My personal favorite thing is the flowers. Right now there are none anywhere. Then about a week before the park opens they appear in full bloom. Granted they are grown somewhere else, but I never thought of that. I really used to think that CP had some great gardener staffers to keep that stuff so colorful and beautiful. Right now it’s just holes of dirt.

I don’t think your bad for caring about ride moments during the spring. During work crew it’s one of the only things people talk about. It just signs of the season finally starting!
*** Edited 3/29/2005 11:36:20 PM UTC by 901liveson***

The dates can be seen while in line for the ride. Look at the supports and you can clearly see the dates. He wasn't talking about staring at the webcam for hours on end.

901liveson said:
My personal favorite thing is the flowers. Right now there are none anywhere. Then about a week before the park opens they appear in full bloom. Granted they are grown somewhere else, but I never thought of that. I really used to think that CP had some great gardener staffers to keep that stuff so colorful and beautiful. Right now it’s just holes of dirt.

You mean they *don't* have great gardeners to keep that stuff so colorful and beautiful?

Hey, Walt..........! :)

ForgottenEE, can they even use standard fall protection up there? At some point you have to tell OSHA to do something unmentionable, and switch to real climbing and rappelling gear just to get at some of those joints! I'm a little surprised that they are still doing annual torque checks on the whole thing...I thought they were supposed to torque it after the first year, then switch to a percentage schedule similar to the re-tracking schedule for the wood coasters.

(you also had me on the floor with that one off-season activity...!)

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

News to me!

I thought he ment that you could see the bolts while looking through the camera on FunCoast.

In theory Dave, you don't have to wear a safety harness while working on the top of the lift hill, there is a hand-rail. :)

Of course the 3 foot gap between the top of the evac car and the first step is another issue ;)

Personally, it was one of the highlights of my pre and post season to go up there and install/remove our equiptment each season. *** Edited 3/30/2005 1:45:32 AM UTC by Red Garter Rob***

Are flowers even planted by opening? I remember the flower boxes under sky-ride being fairly bare on opening day last year. I dont' think the planting is done till later in May. Heck, at MA we were riding the be-bop bvd. cars in early June and they were just then planting around the signs.

There is some color by opening, but most flowers get planted from May to mid-June.

I'm pretty sure I heard somewhere that the flowers don't get planted until they're sure there won't be any more frost. You wouldn't want to go to all that trouble of planting those things only to have them killed off by a cold Ohio night in May.

Yeah, frost.. bites. :)

Looks like I did my fair share of misleading with my last post. All the bolts were torqued down in 2001, you will see dates from all of the years since on various bolts, but not every year on all of them.

I ment when your actually at the park, you can see them from the quene if you look closely. It's easiest to see it from exit as you are right next to the track. You might be able to catch a few more if you have a good zooming device such as a camera or binoculars.

Rob, say this with me. FUN-NIC-U-LAR. :)

If you think that 3 foot gap is bad... When the wind blows, sometimes a cable two comes out of the pulley at the top. That requires climbing the lift using the anti-rollback slots for a footing and climbing up the hill to that point. Tieing off, then climb down onto the fanicular track. After that you have to find a way to get your hands free to get the cables back on track.

...Your hands, which, by this time, are clinging to anything they can reach with a reflexive death-grip, of course. :)

Regarding the bolts...I hadn't looked that closely at the dates. I thought perhaps they found enough loose ones in 2002 that they decided they needed to go over the whole thing every year.

That's gotta be a monsterous job. I'd think it would make Arrow's welded structures look like a good idea again. 'Course, those don't get loose...they just crack and break instead.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Some flowers do very well with the colder temperatures and die off or stop blooming consistently by mid summer. I notice they plant pansies, a cold loving flower, in some places by opening day and later replace them with heat loving varieties as the season progresses.
Now back on topic. Forgotten EE are the bolts on a rotating schedule to get torqued? Or is it random depending on how far they have moved from the last torque? I think I remember seeing lines indicating where they were tightened to, correct?

Iron Dragon... How can a ride that feels so slow, develop so many cracks?

I honestly don't know what kind of toque rotation they have on MF. I assume that they decided what bolts they are going to check on which year. Yes, there are lines on each bolt. Nice observation. If they don't line up, it's obvious there is a problem. Each ride has it's own quirks that get special attention. MF gets more attention on the main rope about 40 feet from the catch car...

Walt, is MF getting those purty TTD seats this year?