4-D Coaster

Well, if B&M's business goes down, all that means is that Intamin's will go up. Those are pretty much the only two competing right now, no?

No ziggy, you're right, X gave an incredible experience, and although it didn't neccessarily have the greatest layout, and was a tad rough etc., it was still an amazing thrill.

B&M and Intamin are probably the two highest profile designers (steel) but there are still plenty of companies out there making plenty of good rides : Maurer Sohne, Premier, Vekoma, Reverchon

With a good crew and enough people on the platform, AND two trains, AND a redesigned seat rotation in the station, I could seriously see a ride like X (at another park, hehe), crack 1,000-1,200 peeps per hour.

Personally, I think it was the biggest gamble BUILDING the ride....second only to the risk PKI took on their monstrous woodie....and I apploud those parks for *going out on a limb*....

The 4-D would be WAY less rough though, if the riders weren't "so far out on a limb" in terms of the distance from the rails to the outside edge of those seats....train design WILL have to be rethought in the next version I'm sure...maybe only two riders per "row", one on either side? ;)

In my humble opinion, A B&M flyer with an aggressive layout would whomp a 4-D anyday, anytime, anyplace.

But that's just me.

-'Playa

You have humble opinions, 'Playa??? ;)

LOL @ George...:)

Playa...I'd *still* take the 4-D, but we've been TRYING to get a Beemer train on a Vek Flyer since the first lap on a B&M flyer at SFoG's Grand opening....no luck YET...;)

Look out. New member posting :)

Anyway, a few weeks ago I was doing some random searching online and I came across this link.

If you scroll most of the way down you'll see a 4D-like design from the company Hoei Sangyo. If you look at the design of the cars you'll notice that the seats only tilt forward and backward 90 degrees or so (does that only make it a 3.5D? :D). Also there does not seem to be any extra rails so that leaves me asking about how this thing works. Now this is a news archive from January of 2002 so maybe I'm just bringing up old news that everyone already knows about.

Here is the link to Hoei Sangyo's website.

After the little intro plays and you get to their main site, off to the left there will be a bunch of yellow bubbles. Click on the 3rd one from the top. That will bring you to the roller coaster section of their website. After that you will see the 4Dish coaster in the upper left. Click that and you will get a couple more pics. Now I'm assuming that the first picture there is of a prototype of some sort (if I only knew Japanese :\ ) and not a park installation.

Well, I hope this was of some interest to all of you.