Shockwave (SFoT)

I work in a multi-story office building directly across from SFoT and today there is a large crane which would appear to be for the construction of the new Tony Hawk coaster. But, the crane is currently sitting inside the final turn of Shockwave and there is a piece of green track on a flatbed next to the crane, and a piece missing from SW. Is it normal to remove entire track sections for maintenance or is there something else going on with this coaster?

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Brett, Resident Launch Whore Anti-Enthusiast (the undiplomatic one)

Someone on this site said that they were going to get new track for Shockwave, and Demon. I don't know if they telling the truth or not?

It is an old ride. They weren't running two trains on it when I was there, but yet it was early on in the season. They could just be dumping it, or just fixing one piece of track. Again, it's an old ride, and probably has a lot of maintenance every year. No ride is safe with Shapiro.

That was an idiotic rumor from a source that was deemed very wrong. I thought I read something about Shockwave needing some minor structural work done because it sits in a flood-prone area. Maybe the track was removed so a crane would have access to a certain part of the ride so said work could be completed?

^Shoring up some footings? Perhaps. The one day we were there after some MAJOR rains the previous night, the area around Shockwave was flooded pretty badly. Of course, it still opened WAY before Titan or Giant...

Standing by my earlier appraisals...Best.Looper.Standing.

How about best looper not standing?

I've heard it's undergoing refurbishment, a few track sections at a time. SFOT has a short off-season so it could take a few years to finish. Apparently the decision was made to save it and put some investment into keeping it going for a while longer. So maybe the crowned heads of SF really do know what's worth saving. (If you're a fan of Deja Vu or Chiller, please don't take offense and I'm sorry for your loss.)

That's what I've heard too, they will be replacing track over the next couple of off seasons.

Rob-Shock Wave is good, but the Mind Bender is the best. :O)

Rob, I'd probably have to go with B:TC...

Shockwave is almost as good as Mindbender. I hope neither one leaves anytime soon. Two rides totally worth rebuilding to original spec if they reach a point where they can no longer be maintained.

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AV Matt
Long live the Big Bad Wolf

I'd give the edge to Mind Bender (cough...two words...cough) over Shocky. However both are totally amazing coasters...some of the best EVER built. I'd even venture to say Shocky is still the signature coaster at SFOT and it would be totally foolish to remove it.

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I survived a Japanese typhoon and the Togo flat ride of death!!!!!!

I don't know how long Shockwave's line gets at SFOT, but for keeping Demon as being retracked, I think that's quite stupid. The ride usually has a walk-on except when the whole park is packed. The line is empty a whole lot.

What they are trying to do (It sounds like.) is to keep the ride for many years because it's so popular. This is like a ride like the Matterhorn, Space Mountain (DL and WDW), and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. The ride is ageless to the fact that it's always popular no matter if it's 20 or 30 years old. I think Demon has worn out it's welcome.

I don't think it's ageless like Space Mountain where I had to wait 40 minutes to get on with BOTH sides going in a slow season. I really do like Shockwave at that park. The line would tell me if it's ageless or not.

The fact is that it's cheaper just replacing track pieces than to buy a brand new roller coaster. That is what this guy is thinking. He rather save the money on rides, and he rather waste his money by putting up new stupid signs that cost million and millions of dollars. The thing is that you still have to put new rides in the park every so often to keep people coming back.

It sounds to me that the Whizzer is going to be dumped pretty soon at SFGAm if this is happening. If they are going to spend all that money retracking Demon, I really doubt that they will also spend money on Whizzer. Plus, they think they added the kiddie coasters, so they feel the kids have more rides to go on so it doesn't matter.

Wizzer ain't leaving. If you payed attention a couple of years ago when they tried to take it out the first time, they lost to many people and had so many protestors that they had to take out another ride instead just because of the GP's opinion of what they were doing.

Demon on the other hand may get new track but it looks like it will over go a revamp. The best sign of this is that the trains were all revamped last year.

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Webmaster/Podcast host for Coasterfanbase.com
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thrillerman1 said:
Mind Bender (cough...two words...cough)

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not according to this:
http://www.rcdb.com/ig37.htm?picture=17

I've seen both. Generally everyone seems to do two words for Georgia's and one word for Edmonton's just to distinguish them. I don't care, I think it's still better than Shock Wave. Doesn't have those two spots of killer catapult airtime like Shock Wave, but overall a better ride. And Revolution with lap bars was as good as either of them.

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Seahawk & the Wave said:thrillerman1 said:
Mind Bender (cough...two words...cough)

not according to this:
http://www.rcdb.com/ig37.htm?picture=17

I've seen both. Generally everyone seems to do two words for Georgia's and one word for Edmonton's just to distinguish them.

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Well maybe SF is having trouble deciding because when you go to their website it's two words.

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I survived a Japanese typhoon and the Togo flat ride of death!!!!!!

I know, I've seen both. The older logos from before the green/post-Batman era were two words. I think they want it to be two words, but they spent a gazillion dollars on a new logo 11 years ago that shows it as one word. Ah, there's bigger things to worry about - like, when Mindbender / Mind Bender needs the kind of overhaul that Shock Wave (Shockwave?) is getting, will they do it? Sure hope so.

It's been a long-running debate whether its Mind Bender or Mindbender. It's the only one I've ridden and without having ridden the SFOT ride, I can honestly say it's one of the best steel coasters around... perhaps the best regular sit-down looping coaster you'll ever find.

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Sheikrafanatic said:
Wizzer ain't leaving. If you payed attention a couple of years ago when they tried to take it out the first time, they lost to many people and had so many protestors that they had to take out another ride instead just because of the GP's opinion of what they were doing.

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I very highly doubt that Whizzer being "saved" had anything to do with public outcry.

-Nate

Then how do you explain that they randomly switched where they were putting the ride. The only 2 factors that could have explained why is one for space, and 2 for maintenance issues. So lets take a look at that, Lets look maintenance wise, Shockwave needed new wheels every once in a while and had a loop that needed extra inspecting everyday, while whizzer on the other hand needs new wheels also but can't buy new ones but the manufacturer that made it so it is expensive to find new wheels, also the trains are extremely old, the ride parts are old and need extra inspecting and it has crashed twice I believe, so in other words it is a maintenance nightmare compared to Shockwave, yet they took out Shockwave. Now lets look at it in terms of space

Whizzer's spot
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&time=&date=&ttype=&q=six+flags+great&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=41.496446,77.255859&ie=UTF8&ll=42.368029,-87.935643&spn=0.001185,0.002358&t=h&z=19&om=1/

Shockwave's old spot
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&time=&date=&ttype=&q=six+flags+great&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=41.496446,77.255859&ie=UTF8&ll=42.371059,-87.934286&spn=0.001185,0.002358&t=h&z=19&om=1/

They are nearly Identical so then tell me why did they change it if it wasn't GP's opinion then what other factor came in? *** Edited 1/9/2008 12:59:43 AM UTC by Sheikrafanatic***

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You're spouting off a lot of misinformation here. Care to cite your sources for any of your claims?

Parts for Whizzer are both available and (relatively) inexpensive. Consideration for removing the ride certainly had little to do with the availability of affordable parts.

There's no doubt in my mind that Six Flags had originally intended on placing S:UF in Whizzer's place. But a fairly significant incident on Shockwave a week or two before Whizzer was set to close sealed both of those rides' fates.

-Nate