Another SFGAm outing. Perfect!!!! 6/9

If any day for me at an amusement park can get flawless and perfect, it was this day.

Even after visiting CP, I truly appreciate the fact that Six Flags can give you a great day just like the folks in Sandusky.

Every coaster was running today with full capacity and no stacking. I mean none!!!

But what truly made this day a highlight for me was the fact that I FINALLY got on Deja-Vu. My buddy and I got into line around 3:00 and we were on the back car by 4:00. This ride is a definite winner in the experience department. All out intensity and border line insanity with the holding on the vertical towers and the killer footchoppers. I love Deja-Vu. Nuff said.

I wont go into detail about the other coasters because I have gone through this before but we were getting on everything in minimal time. 3 train operation on RB all day, 4 train operation on American Eagle all day. The Batman crew were pumping the trains out just as frequently as what I experienced with Raptor at CP.

In conclusion, I left today with a big smile today. Everything was flawless from the coasters to the moderate crowds to the overall experience of picking and choosing what to ride without a hangup.

Thanks for reading. :)

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""To be the man, WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!, You got to beat the man""!!!

(grumble) I was going to go today, but unfortunatly didn't. Gald ya had fun though. I'll try to hit the park Tomorrow and Thursday.

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Zakk Wylde's Black Label Society-Chicago Chapter

*** This post was edited by Ozzyhead on 6/10/2002. ***

Why is it the Sfog and sfmm's deja-vu is 196 ft and sfga is 176?

It was nice that the park wasnt that busy today and most lines were small. But to have a new ride not open till 300pm is a joke and makes the park look 2nd rate imho.They didnt even start testing De-jaVu till afternoon. The only reason not to open the ride at the park opening is soley for money or they would have tested the ride far earlier in the day. Also Whizzer/Demon werent open at opening which gave the under 48" crowd little to do for thrill rides(Big Drop also opended late) and in the kid area's the crawl thru netting area was closed and has yet to open and a employee stated it might not open all year because the park is to cheap to replace the nets that have some holes. Its sad that when a park opens at 1000am and all your major rides arent up and running from the get go. I thought the employees did a excellant job on the rides, escpecially at Shockwave late at night when their were little crowds but they still hustled to get the train out on the track and encouraged re-rides. The park itself was good but management leaves alot to be desired!!

Steel Raptor, all the Deja Vu's are the same height at 176 feet. Glad you finally got to ride Deja Vu Chitown.

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Top 5 Coasters 1.Deja Vu(SFGAm)2.Raging Bull(SFGAm)3.Millennium Force(CP)4.CornBall Express(IB)5.Viper(SFGAm)
CoasterWorld

BobO. Unless you know the specific reasons as to why DV didnt open until the afternoon, I really dont think its fair to pass judgement on the park.

The ride is unreliable and it isnt the parks fault. Heck, when we were waiting in line, 3 maintenance workers were just standing in the staion anticipating something would go wrong. Its unfortunate but it doesnt qualify the park at being 2nd rate.

I for one enjoyed myself and I dont sit there and analyze every little flaw or assuming the park isnt trying hard enough.

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""To be the man, WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!, You got to beat the man""!!!

Deja-Vu is a ride that needs temps to be over 70 thats why the late start morning temps around Chic-e-G can be cool at times .With the late starts they will piss off less people. IMO.

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---- IGGY .

You have to pass judgement on a park that advertises 2 new rides and then barely has them running in the same year. And now year 2 they advertise one of their major rides and it is closed more than it is open. If not to save money then explain why the rides isnt even testing when the park opens??? And it was a warm day and not a day with inclement weather. And the park shouldnt be held resposnible for contracting with a company that provides unrelieable rides?? If it is that bad tear it down and put something else in like Knotts is doing right now. What good is a ride if it is only going to be open half the time and can only run 1 train every 5 mintues which it did on sunday as we timed it!!! And if weather related why put in a ride that is so easily affected by weather in the mid-west where it is often chilly.

What other park has anyone been to that advertises a new ride(other than SF) and doesnt have the ride open when the park does on a consistent basis?? If not 2nd rate what does is qualify as, exceeding customers statisfaction/expectations??? When i go to a park i expect everything open when the park opens and not having numerous rides closed so that my younger kids have little to do. I guess some people dont want to hold parks up to any type of standards.

In one sense, I do think it is odd that DV never opens in the morning. I mean, the day I went last week the temperature was mid-upper 60's in the morning. Beautiful weather. It didn't begin testing til around 11:30. Also, the sign outside the park said that DV "might" not be operating. I wonder if they put that sign up every day regardless, just to cover their backs. Nevertheless, I'm excited that the coaster seems to be operating on a daily basis. It's a wicked ride, and now that SFGAm is firing on all cylinders, it's a heck of a park. In my book, the park now has 5 "must-ride" coasters (Bull, DV, V2, AE Backwards, Viper), which is impressive (though currently Bull isn't doing much for me).

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SFGAm:
1. Deja Vu
2. Vertical Velocity
3. AE Backwards
4. Viper
5. Raging Bull

So according to Mr. Bob O, we're supposed to just turn a key and start testing right away in the morning? Did you NOT see the mechanics up at the ride? Apparently not. Did you NOT see the entire crew at the ride? (they were there) So to make your "professional" judgement that Vu was closed for budgetary reasons is absolutely absurd. If you don't think your car is safe to operate, I sure hope you don't decide to see what's wrong with it by driving it on the interstate! Oh, Chitown, thanks for the kind words. Hope to see you at the park someday!

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Quoth the Jaguar...."Check"

*** This post was edited by Spacecase8310 on 6/10/2002. ***

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Chitown said:

Heck, when we were waiting in line, 3 maintenance workers were just standing in the staion anticipating something would go wrong.

Lol I see them everytime, there is always mantenance sitting by the ride to fix it as soon as something goes wrong. This proves SFGAm is trying to keep the ride open as much as possible. About the Deja Vu not operating sign in the front of the park in the morning, I think this will stay up everyday until the ride has started operating. It has been up everyday I have been to the park so far this year. On the days Deja Vu has opened I have noticed the name off the list by the time I went to get lunch. And Mr. Bob would you want your kids riding on unsafe rides, im assuming something had to be wrong with both Whizzer and Demon for them to not be operating in the morning they usually do operate in the mornings.

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Top 5 Coasters 1.Deja Vu(SFGAm)2.Raging Bull(SFGAm)3.Millennium Force(CP)4.CornBall Express(IB)5.Viper(SFGAm)
CoasterWorld

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Iggy this whole temp. thing isnt working for me, they say has to be above 55 then they say it has to be above 50, where are we even getting these numbers from? Has SF themselves come out and said that? People just keep giving temps, but I know that its lower then what I have heard because I have rode it in weather as low as 42, and when I rode it when it was that cold, it didnt get time to warm up in warmer weather, it started out the day like this.

Yeah, sometimes parks are trying as hard as they can on problems, and people don't realize it. Sometimes there is almost nothing they can do about it. Maybe they just can't.

Like Six Flags for example, if they had any creativity with names, they would use it! But they don't and can't! :)

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Why do they report power outages on TV?

I talked a mechanic at the parklast year at Fright Fest, just making small talk while waiting in line for the ride and he stated that the grease in the wheel bearings gets tough when it gets under 55 degrees. I believe it because I used to change car tires and wheel bearings. I have seen several wheel bearings toreup during the winter. during the summer when the heat is about 60 degrees the grease turns more to a softer texture thus becoming liquid. This plus the intial liftup the 1st tower backwards not being high enough is what I can tell is contributing to the ride's problems. Sometimes when the train goes up the second tower I have noticed that the catch wagon does not come down far enough to catch the train. I stood watching the problems during the Fright Fest last year and each time the catch wagon on the second tower came down, it came down at different heights. Sometimes it didn't even come down fast enough. I think that if the second catch wagon came down at the same height all the time and consistantly, the ride would run more with less valleying and downtime. That's just my thought and observations on watching the ride in motion on though.

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Beer, my soon to be wife, coasters, and the FREEDOM OF SPEECH. Is this a great country or what!!
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stoogemanmoe and places to get discount Six Flags Great America tickets!

So are we too believe that mechanics have to be at the ride EVERY morning to check it out till afternoon??? If that is the case why arent the mechanics at the park earlier checking out the ride??? Or does the ride have too open late every day, if and when it opens??? Shouldnt a ride that runs at two other parks on a more consistent basis run as good at this park? If the ride is so badly constructed that it takes 3 mechanics to fix on a daily basis and causes a ride crew to sit around and do nothing for hours on end wouldnt the park consider putting something else in its place?? What good is it to hype a ride for 2 straight years when it runs less than half your park hours??

The demon and whizzer both started to run at noon so it seemed alot more likely that they were planned to open late rather than mechanical problems, they both opened at the same time.

If you are referring to the day that I went (last Sunday), I got to the park at 10:30 and both the Demon and Whizzer were open.

I can understand your fustration with Deja-Vu. Heck, I am frustrated as well but to flat out say that the park isnt trying hard enough is premature and speculation. I for one do not believe that they are just purposely aggravating guests by not having the ride open consistently. There are reasons that I am sure are valid and neither you or myself are going to know what they are.

I am not trying to argue with you Bob but lately all you have been doing is ragging on this park. If you dont like it, than dont go. Its that simple. No park is going to please everyone (yes, that includes CP), so if you are frequenting SFGAm and leaving with a sour taste in your mouth, why deal with aggravation?

Just my opinion on this so dont take it personally.

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""To be the man, WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!, You got to beat the man""!!!

*** This post was edited by Chitown on 6/11/2002. ***

Chi-Town i did go the same sunday you went. My wife says that when she tried to ride the rides at a time which would have been between 10:30 and 11:00am and she says neither were open, and few rides were open that the small kids could ride. The cars were open but not much else on that side of the park, orbit/hometown fun machine were also closed.

I do rag about the park, but i believe they should be held to higher standards than some are willing to hold them too. I love wdw but on other sites on the web i criticze them more than SF even though i enjoy a park like i do SFGAM or i wouldnt be a season passholder. I think the employee's do a great job but i think it makes no sense at all that when a park opens that all rides arent running!! I can see a occasional ride down, but their are always rides not running when the park opens but are running later in the day. My belief is if we dont hold parks to high standards things will only slowly get worse and not better, companies need to be pushed or will be complacent. And i dont take it personally at all and enjoy the good banter even if we may not agree.

For Dejuvu, if they cant get the ride running by years end where it is running almost all the time like RB/Batman with a good capacity, not a train every 5 minutes then they should tear it down and start anew with a different ride that will be consistent. Juts my opinion for what its worth.

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Chitown said:

If any day for me at an amusement park can get flawless and perfect, it was this day.

...

Thanks for reading.

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Thanks for writing!

Great TR. I've only dreamt about days like you had.

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Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." - Albert Einstein