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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 2nd, 2017, 2:09 pm
^They couldn't do that. That's not enough room unless somehow they would go backstage, and than it would almost have to go to Triple Play area with cutting down some trees. Than, the trolley rails would be totally messed up.

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Postby SFGAmFan12 on July 2nd, 2017, 3:26 pm
ilrider wrote:
doubleb wrote:
BCarroll wrote:I think they should go back to using the pictures. Way quicker entry times and that way SF doesn't have to purchase more scanners.


SF should just take pictures at pass processing, but not put them on the passes. Just have the picture come up on a screen when they scan it. That's how Cedar Fair does it. I get comments on my photo. Also, you can scan the picture in yourself online when you buy or renew a pass. If it's a new pass you just need to stop in to the processing center for one time visual verification and they will let you change your picture if you want to. The finger print idea was always suspect to me. SF tried to ease people's discomfort with statements about it. They still had a partial finger print of you on file that they had to match for verification, which makes some people uncomfortable.


I did not like using my fingerprint one bit, and I told the park so in surveys, but I also hated how much longer it took people to get into the park. Really dumb idea, whomever at corporate came up with it. Just scanning the passes with the handheld scanner obviously is a ton faster, even though they do not have the photo anymore. Having to wait for the fingerprint to be accepted then also scan the pass increased the wait time to get in significantly. Common sense should rule the day in business with something like that.

CF model makes sense.


Fingerprint does take too long but I love being able to get my season pass at the front gate instead of the awful three hour season pass line for photos during Fright Fest (I remember 2011 was particularly awful). I just thought it was odd last week with the amount of money I am sure they spent to upgrade and to be back using the same technology.

My only concern with no verification is if the pass was stolen...there is no way at all to verify the owner of it and I am not sure how they would handle replacing it.
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Postby RollingCoasting on July 2nd, 2017, 3:28 pm
doubleb wrote:None of that makes sense. First 4D's don't fit with WW theming.


Why would it matter if they themed it to WW?
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Postby Coaster Justin on July 2nd, 2017, 3:31 pm
How about theme it to Harley Quinn?
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 2nd, 2017, 3:57 pm
doubleb wrote:
Ilovthevu' wrote:^They should have put Joker in County Fair games area, and called it Wonder Woman. Than, East River Crawler would still be there, and the Orbit would still be there. They could have put a KMG Afterburner where Ragin Cajun is, and just spread some of those games elsewhere. That area is a big waste of space.


None of that makes sense. First 4D's don't fit with WW theming. WW themed ride will surely come to the park and can be done with any one of 3 flats, Skyscreamer, Giant Discovery, or an Endeavour. It would have made no sense to put Joker in County Fair, as it seems they are in the process of turning Mardi Gras to a DC area. The have taken out essentially all the Mardi Gras stuff and games this year. Why would SF buy a KMG Afterburner when they are buying pendulums from Zamperla. The Orbit left for a reason, it's an old ride and it was not a Huss Enterprise and thus easier to find parts for.


Than, why is the first 4d coaster that Six Flags put in themed to Batman? Why is a ride themed to Raging Bull yet it's one of the tallest coasters in the park? You can theme any ride to whatever you want to theme it to. It's just a label in order to get people excited. It's because the KMG Afterburners are the superior rides with more force than just meandering rides like the Max Air ride. The Max Air ride is not a bad ride at all, but it's just doesn't have a huge force at all.

They took out the Orbit because they think that the Joker makes up for the Orbit. The Joker is so much like an upside down flat ride that they decided to take out the Orbit for it. The Orbit just doesn't even feel like you are going upside down flat. It's not like the Joker ride at all. They still have the Enterprise at St. Louis, and another ride similar like the XCalibur. Why not Great America keep the Orbit, and St. Louis give the spare Enterprise ride to Great America (St. Louis is building one from Fiesta Texas now.) instead of St. Louis having 2 very similar rides. That is dumb.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 2nd, 2017, 4:41 pm
doubleb wrote:
Goku1910 wrote:It's just not a very good coaster in general, it could be replaced with anything and be better. Joker should have gone there.

Capacity is garbage, downtime is high, and it's not even a good launched coaster.

.


Capacity is garbage, downtime is high, and it's not a good coaster...that's exactly what can be said about the Joker, a ride you seem to like. No way the ride should have been placed in V2 spot. Btw, 4D's have lower capacity than V2. I would not bet on a pure gimmick ride of the Joker having the almost 15yr later ridership that V2 has. I would even bet that the ridership is about equal now, the reason the Joker has long lines is largely about low capacity and operations. S&S claims 720/hr which is nonsense the thing runs at 500/hr, likely less.


I did not say I liked Joker, I called it a gimmick. It's cool and unique but that's about it. That alone doesn't make it a good coaster. I classify it more like a regular ride and although I have been surprised at how quickly it's line moved the 6 times I've been on it, I still don't consider it a great addition since it discourages me from traveling to other SF parks because of clones.

S&S 4D = 720 people per hour. (estimated from S&S)
Intamin claims it's impulse can reach over 1,200 but if you do some short math you can compare it. 28 passenger train with let's say a 3 minute dispatch interval equals to about 560 people in an hour. You can beat the S&S 4D easily with a 2 minute dispatch but let's be honest, how often does V2 dispatch that quickly? Especially not recently. 2 minutes is a 840 people per hour. Still no where near Intamin's fact-sheet estimate.

I can't really do the math on the S&S since it's a ride that essentially runs itself for the most part. so take these numbers as you will.
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 2nd, 2017, 4:55 pm
^S&S 4d of 720 is just not right. You can't believe what manufacturers say about capacity because it just never happens. A pov of the ride is about 1:10. That's 8 people, and they barely ever send another car right away (from what I've seen). About 50 cars 1 hour x 8 = 400 people.

If they did send multiple cars much, much faster, maybe it would be 500 people, but don't believe manufacturers theoretical capacity.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 2nd, 2017, 5:05 pm
That's why I mentioned Intamin claimed 1,200. I also explained that I was going off S&S's fact sheet and that estimating it myself would be difficult since it almost runs itself.

I worked at the park before and after loose article bins were reintroduced so I saw capacity first hand. Any ride other than Raging Bull getting over 1,000 was nothing short of amazing. Intamin claiming to get 1,200 is just unrealistic.
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Postby CoasterRiderSC on July 3rd, 2017, 11:46 am
doubleb wrote:
SFGAmFan12 wrote:
Fingerprint does take too long but I love being able to get my season pass at the front gate instead of the awful three hour season pass line for photos during Fright Fest (I remember 2011 was particularly awful). I just thought it was odd last week with the amount of money I am sure they spent to upgrade and to be back using the same technology.

My only concern with no verification is if the pass was stolen...there is no way at all to verify the owner of it and I am not sure how they would handle replacing it.


Simple solution to pass processing is have it available at more times. Also, if notice CF parks have their pass centers outside of the gates so you can actually process by coming to the ark early on your 1st visit. SF for many initial processing occurs at the turn gate which slows the line, if it was not done in the fall.

Picture verification stops the use of loss/stolen passes. Every time your pass is scanned for entry your picture comes up on little monitor. This also occurs for parking at the booth at CF, so people don't use another pass holders platinum pass for free parking. SF you can borrow a Gold pass to avoid paying for parking. People probably do this. Just like people get drink refills for others or could even borrow a drink bottle of a person not at the park that day. CF scans your pass for a drink refill to make sure you get one only every 15 minutes and the drink pass will not work if you aren't scanned as entering the park that day. I also like CF you can have drink pass with the option of not having a bottle to carry around. This is a big deal b/c CF, especially CP has many rides with no loose articles in the station.


Personally, I could care less about soda refills! I got the free bottle on our first visit and used it only that one day. I hate soda and only got it for my daugther. Plus I hate carrying the thing around. People complain about ride dispatch times, well if everyone didn't need to stow their soda bottle, rides would take off faster.

As for the pass security, I believe I read somewhere that the actual fingerprint is NOT stored in Six Flags systems anywhere? If that's true, then it has to be stored on the card itself. Why not have a small photo embedded on the card like a DL has??
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Postby CoasterRiderSC on July 3rd, 2017, 11:50 am
Goku1910 wrote:It's just not a very good coaster in general, it could be replaced with anything and be better. Joker should have gone there.

Capacity is garbage, downtime is high, and it's not even a good launched coaster.

And although I agree that Demon should be next on the chopping block you can trust me on this. With current management, it's not happening.


I totally agree with you about V2. It's not a "must have" ride for me when I visit. I would much rather ride Whizzer than V2! V2 doesn't really thrill me and it's just an "ok" ride. But, they should only remove it when/if they have a replacement for it. And, same thing goes for Demon. I usually only ride Demon if other/better rides are crowded or a I want to "pad my stats" for the day!
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 3rd, 2017, 4:06 pm
Today, on coasterqueue, V2 has a 70 minute line. A ride no one likes.. Batman is 70, Superman is 100, X-Flight is 55, Raging Bull is somehow 25 min?, and Goliath is at 85 min. American Eagle has 25, Demon had 35, and Viper has 35.

Back to what was saying as in the order coasters should close: Demon (1st), Viper (2nd), Whizzer (3rd), and Eagle (4th). Not V2 gone first. That is dumb. They don't have Whizzer, Zipper (joker), or Batman indoors times for some reason.

I think the reason why you see Viper, American Eagle, and Raging Bull are having 25 or 35 minutes is because I think the park now has too many sub-par airtime rides. It's like they are trying to improve each year by getting better airtime rides. Thus, that's why they built Goliath even though I personally don't like Goliath at all. With those 3, I didn't even include what I feel has the best airtime in the park, and that's Batman indoors. The problem was that we got the first B&M mega coaster, and some of them today are so much better like I feel Diamondback and Goliath (SFOG) are just amazing. The Intamin Superman at Six Flags America is another wow amazing airtime ride. The B&M Dive Machines have nice air time also.

For Raging Bull, why can't the move the trim to another portion of the ride? I understand they want to slow the ride down, but why that part? Why not before the small helix instead? It still won't be as good as other ones in my opinion, but it will improve it a little bit. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Six+F ... 87.9360473
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Postby RollingCoasting on July 3rd, 2017, 4:54 pm
^ Just curious, why do you feel Viper needs to go? It's a coaster that both thrill-seekers and families can enjoy, and seems to be well-liked by many park-goers. Not trying to sound like an ass but just because you think it's sub-par doesn't mean it needs to go.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 3rd, 2017, 5:03 pm
^Viper is fine but still needs some more trackwork; it's drop has gotten better this year. Eagle could come down but thanks to zoning restrictions it's difficult to replace. Demon and whizzer are on a time limit as it is....

Also, here's a fun rumor. Get ready for attack of the clones. http://screamscape.com/html/industry_news.htm#Skyline
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 3rd, 2017, 5:03 pm
^^Than, Six Flags America should get the dumpy Green Lantern at Magic Mountain, and Jester's Wild Ride. They would love those rides.

The general public is probably 90% of the people that come to Great America. and it's not BAFF. That's like in another week from now.

If Six Flags America is literally the dumping ground, than Green Lantern (as I said), Ninja (SFOG), Demon, and Ninja (SFStL) should all be at Six Flags America. NOT a ride that gets 70 min waits of V2.

Really, a dumping ground park should just close already. If they won't put in new investments into that park, than they should just sell the land already, and get out of there. AstroWorld was previously a dumping ground park, and that park is gone now. If they sold it, Joker's Jinx should come to Great America. Batwing should go to Texas, and Superman should go to St. Louis. This is another Chance Falling Star, but that ride should go back to St. Louis. Ragin Cajun & the SLC should be sold off to someone else.
Last edited by Ilovthevu' on July 3rd, 2017, 5:23 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Postby Guy_With_A_Stick on July 3rd, 2017, 5:23 pm
^Here's the thing, it's not all about popularity. Maintenance and reliability also play huge roles in a ride's lifespan. Comparing Demon and V2: Demon is significantly less popular, anyone can see that. But when was the last time Demon went down for something mechanically? I really can't remember. Arrow has made some pretty rough rides, but for the most part, they're pretty damn reliable. Plus, Demon has the ability to run 3 trains. Now to V2. Although it is relatively popular, it's a maintenance nightmare. It goes down almost every day, it has strict launch guidelines, and requires a cooldown every time it has to dispatch. On top of the 1-train operations, it really makes for bad throughput. So if the park were to choose which ride they would remove based on the maintenance costs, they'd choose V2 in a heartbeat.
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 3rd, 2017, 5:27 pm
^I've seen Demon stuck on the lifthill multiple times, and it was misparking in the station. It also crashed, and got stuck in a loop for probably 2 hours upside down.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 3rd, 2017, 5:28 pm
^^THANK YOU. I know everyone here knows how Six Flags looks at thing financially and they will always take the cheapest route. This is why we're seeing less and less full-circuit launched coasters being added to the chain. Full Throttle and Superman at SFDK were full circuit but nothing compared to something like Maverick.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 3rd, 2017, 5:31 pm
Ilovthevu' wrote:^I've seen Demon stuck on the lifthill multiple times, and it was misparking in the station. It also crashed, and got stuck in a loop for probably 2 hours upside down.


Station mispark has been fixed for a while though. Last that was happening regularly was when I was working it back in 2009-2010. The last time it had a major problem stuck on the lift was a few years ago if I remember right. It was right after it engaged the chain and required an unload.

Why bring up a "crash"? That was in the 80's wasn't it? I'm sure our park's maintenance team has come a long way since then to prevent things like that from happening.
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 3rd, 2017, 5:41 pm
^No, the crash wasn't in the 80's. It had to be in the 2000s. It wasn't severe, but I remember watching it on the news.

A crash in the 80's might have been American Eagle or Whizzer. Whizzer, though might have been the other park. Still, they don't run 5 trains on the Whizzer, and they don't run 3 trains per each side for the Eagle..
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Postby Goku1910 on July 3rd, 2017, 5:45 pm
5 trains on whizzer is for two reasons. Parts from the trains and new safety standards.

Demon's valley was in 1998. Nice try. Google is your friend.
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 3rd, 2017, 5:46 pm
^I'm not talking about Demon's valley. It was in the station.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 3rd, 2017, 5:47 pm
Ilovthevu' wrote:^I'm not talking about Demon's valley. It was in the station.


Okay, that happened even earlier than 1998. So you're still wrong. :lol:

*It was in 1993.
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Postby Ilovthevu' on July 3rd, 2017, 5:51 pm
^Are you sure it didn't happen again later? In 1993, I wasn't into the park (much younger) as I am now.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 3rd, 2017, 5:53 pm
It's not in any incident report I can find. I worked at Demon and Eagle each two years so I'm familiar with them and their general history.
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Postby Goku1910 on July 3rd, 2017, 6:12 pm
That was my point....SF has moved away from Intamin and has opted instead for very cheap designs that fit in similar footprints.
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