A very loud B&M or 2 or 3!

AJFelice said:
A few non-B&M instances of exceptional coaster noise include Son of Beast...
Anyone rememeber the roaring lift on SOB when the original trains were in operation?

Using B&M in the same sentence as SOB made me shutter!
The only thing louder then SOBs lift was the screams of pain from the riders!

I kind of really like coasters that are themed. X2, Terminator Salvation, and Ca Screamin seem to be more fun cause of the music! :)

Jo
Lifetime Raptor flights: 2030 :)

I remember hearing that IoA wanted Hulk to be specifically loud because of the theme of the ride.

Andy, that is correct, its supposed to sound like the hulk yelling

Yes it is true, IHC was designed to sound as loud as possible to give you that "great sensation of being the Hulk" watch that UIOA promo video from 1999, I forgot the name of it. :)

Is that why they use the square wheels?

Hulk, one half best B&M ever, other half nasty boring crap. Kind of like the two sides of Bruce Banner.

I went to BGT a week ago and rode Kumba for the first time since it's rehab. It is a lot louder than it use to be. I heard that they are using a different wheel assembly on it now which is the reason it's louder.

Most of the noise comes from the wheels, and which type they use.

Raptor can be extremely loud when they increase the ratio of nylon to polyurethane (in early spring and fall). When they use less nylon, it becomes quieter.

You will notice, the more Nylon used, the louder the B&M. You can confirm this easily by taking a look at Kumba, which uses a very high percentage... Same with Hulk.

A ride like Batman Knight Flight (Dominator) used only a few, which gave it a quieter, but a nice "roar". Mantis is very loud but also uses quite a bit more Nylon.

This has no relation to those using sand in the supports... Different story :)

Actually, while the "source" of the sound is indeed the wheels, you wouldn't hear it without the supports and track to act as a means for resonance. That's why sand in the supports does such a great job making a coaster quiet - the sand particles are doing the vibrating, which are comparatively silent.

Bartman2 said:
I went to BGT a week ago and rode Kumba for the first time since it's rehab. It is a lot louder than it use to be. I heard that they are using a different wheel assembly on it now which is the reason it's louder.

*Hi Bart*

That makes sense re: wheel assembly. I just knew it couldn't be related to the new paint job, hehe. Definitely WAY louder than in the recent past...

P.S. As Tek mentioned, Top Flight Gun After Deck Burn inverted thingy at (P)Car was seriously loud the last couple days...like LOUD loud. But I think I recall that ride as always being that way...

Riddler's Revenge is my the loudest Beemer to date. You can hear it from the front of the park.

Great Bear and B:TR at Great Adventure are the loudest B&M's I've ridden/been around. Don't remember Hulk being that bad.

djDaemon said:
Actually, while the "source" of the sound is indeed the wheels, you wouldn't hear it without the supports and track to act as a means for resonance. That's why sand in the supports does such a great job making a coaster quiet - the sand particles are doing the vibrating, which are comparatively silent.

I'm not sure I buy that. Looking at typical B&Ms, especially the floorless coasters, you see all kinds of supports: some square, some round, some very long, others just a bracket on the footing (when the coaster is close to the ground). Other times you have multiple supports clustered together, or very few as in two large supports for a loop. Yet the sound seems consistent as the coaster rolls along. If the sound was indeed coming from the supports then you think it would change as the size changes or as the number of supports change, yet it doesn't. I think most of the sound emanates from the hollow box beam that supports the rails.

Photos:
http://www.aceonline.org/census/PhotoDetail.aspx?ID=7784
http://www.aceonline.org/census/PhotoDetail.aspx?ID=2251

I should also mention that at Kings Island you can stand right next to a support on the midway. When I was standing there, a train roared by overhead. The sound was not coming from the support, it was coming from overhead.

By your rationale, Maverick would sound like Millennium Force. Different style of track, but that's kind of my point.

I never thought of Intamin coasters as very loud to begin with. Apparently some sound is generated by the supports as demonstrated by your comparison, but then wouldn't every coaster with similar supports sound the same regardless of track style? We all know that B&Ms are typically louder, and what they all have in common is a hollow box beam between the rails.

Speaking of sounds and their relations to the beams holding up the ride - how about that hollow/echo-y creepy but awesome sound that comes from the 2 Anton "ball and socket" coasters - Mind Bender and Shockwave. Mmmm... I feel a love thread coming on!

Really? Millennium Force starts to make noise around the queue before the train even exits the second tunnel. Maverick makes virtually no noise at all, aside from maybe a slightly loose body panel rattling.

I don't really understand your question. I never said that the type of track had nothing to do with the flavor of sound, I'm saying that the sound dampening seems to have its greatest impact by filling supports, since there's nothing else to fill on an Intamin ride.

Jeff said:
Is that why they use the square wheels?

Don't be silly, IHC has triangular wheels, Kumba has square wheels. :)

I'm saying that all coasters that have hollow tubular supports should all sound the same--if that is indeed where all the sound is coming from. But we know that they don't. B&Ms have a roar that is much louder than other coasters. B&Ms also have a hollow box beam spine that other coaster don't have. The obvious conclusion is that the hollow box beam is contributing to the roar.

Jeffrey Seifert said:
...wouldn't every coaster with similar supports sound the same regardless of track style? We all know that B&Ms are typically louder, and what they all have in common is a hollow box beam between the rails.

Why does it have to be one or the other? As the train rolls along, it causes vibration. That vibration is carried from the source right on through anything it touches - track, supports, the ground, etc. Heck, even if something isn't touching, the vibration can still be transferred to other things over short distances, via the air. It's a lot like electricity in many regards.

Jeff said:
...the sound dampening seems to have its greatest impact by filling supports, since there's nothing else to fill on an Intamin ride.

Exactly. And as you mentioned earlier, it makes little practical sense to fill the spine on B&M track, at least with sand (though someone mentioned a perlite-like material, which would work, though not as well as sand, due to perlite's lower density). Sand-filled track spine would add a tremendous amount of weight to the structure, which would have to be accounted for in the number & size of supports, footers and so on.

Jeffrey Seifert said:I'm saying that all coasters that have hollow tubular supports should all sound the same--if that is indeed where all the sound is coming from.

There are literally thousands of factors that influence vibration. The carbon content of the steel, type of fasteners used, footer size, soil density and on and on.