B&M answered some of our questions

I have to apologize, I don't recall his name, but someone from B&M was at Carowinds yesterday for CoasterStock. Perhaps someone can tell me his name, I couldn't find it online.

Anywho, he answered some long standing questions that crop up often. He wouldn't comment on any new products that may be coming, but he did say he thought enthusiasts would like what was coming, so take that for what it is.

On launches-He said that prefers to stick to more traditional coaster types, and was pumping up the lift hill and how exciting it was with the buildup of potential energy, but they aren't opposed to doing more launches...if the parks want it. He talked about Hulk. One interesting tidbit, when they were designing Hulk, someone asked about how he was going to handle launching up a 45 degree angle without slamming people over the top, and he said that he designed it to invert instead, problem solved.

On height-The 'problem' with higher coasters is how do you burn off the energy at the end, he said. He did talk about the hills and how they don't need hyper coaster trains to be as short as they used to, so that's one of the reasons they redesigned them (along with some other reasons, but I don't remember what all he said). But he said that when you go big, you have to have the real estate to burn off energy. With magnetic brakes, he said it isn't as big of an issue, but the parks still need the real estate, and if a park wants it, again, they'll build it.

On wood-He said that he's designed one wooden coaster ever, and he'd rather not do it again. Not sure if he was referring to Psyclone, but he didn't seem to care for it.

Nice guy, other answers to questions came, but those were some that I know crop up often, so I figured I'd share.

Edited: Long to Short on the trains

Did he say whether they fill the box beam or the supports with sand, if at all? :)

Did anyone ask why they are so Hell-bent on trimming the airtime out of all of their rides?

Nobody asked about either question. But my gash Intimidator without the 2nd trim in last nite was fantastic.

Tekwardo said:

He did talk about the hills and how they don't need hyper coaster trains to be as long as they used to, so that's one of the reasons they redesigned them (along with some other reasons, but I don't remember what all he said).

Are you sure you heard him right? The redesigned trains are much longer than their predecessors.

Sorry, I meant to say as short as they used to be, LOL. He said that what they've learned with the hypers and using mag brakes, and redesigning the hills that they no longer need the trains to be as short as they used to be.

Acoustic Viscosity said:
Did anyone ask why they are so Hell-bent on trimming the airtime out of all of their rides?

I feel like on the newer B&M's (I'm thinking Diamondback and Behemoth), the trims only turn on when the coaster is above a certain speed; I always thought/understood it was to always keep the train moving at the speed it was designed.

For the B&M's that have trims which have neutered airtime, are those later additions? By the parks or by B&M? I know Raging Bull never opened with those trims on the third hill, for example.

Regardless if it's a park thing or a B&M thing, the new hypers are certainly not short on airtime.

Which third hill, the one after the hammerhead? Because that was there when it opened.

I will say this about trims and what not, with the 2nd trim off, there was a definite 'rattle' on the ride all the way to the MCBR. I'm not complaining, but it was very noticeable. I'd much rather have rattling AND airtime, so it didn't bother me, but mayhaps they do it for maintenance reasons.

The ride without that 2nd trim was unbelievable, though.

Rattling to me is meaningless. The air on the ride last night was amazing...for a non-Goliath Beemer.

Today, however, we got to ride "the mistake" B&M hyper. I don't mean to tell anyone their business, LOL, but oG definitely got the platinum verion - daytime ride, the trim on more than I ever recall (crazy hot today), still hit harder. Much harder. But I will have to say I-232 is now firmly in second place...those front-seat rides to end the night had seriously sustained intense floats...and the two *swerving* drops are crazy fun.

Out of curiosity, what makes the oG Goliath a mistake? Just the stronger-than-typical airtime for a B&M hyper? I remember around the opening that someone rode it with either the B or the M of B&M and they commented on how they screwed up the ending (referring I think to the gut-punch you get from the little last hop going directly into the mag brakes), but I don't recall them admitting to the airtime being 'accidental'.

Being reallyyy nerdy and studying the evolution of B&M hill shapes, if anything oG was where they tried their new hill shapes, one ride before they debuted the new trains. The result? Well, the new hill shapes strike me as are more conducive to sustained airtime (higher target speeds over a less-pointy/higher radius apex) than old school B&M's like Apollo's Chariot, and the old school, shorter trains would experience less of a push/pull effect than the the newer ones when going over them.

For you the rider, that means that your butt stays out of your seat for both the going-up and going-down sides of the hill, whereas on the older rides that was less true. The old hill design (pointier/tighter radius peak with a lower target velocity) meant that the front seat riders got most of their airtime on the way up, but basically settled into their seat shortly after the apex of the hill (while the track was still pitching down), and the opposite was true of the back seat (almost no airtime until just before you crested the hill and began to get whipped over).

I suspect that the reason oG seems slightly mistake-y (in the best sense of the word), is that, while it seems to share the new hill design with Behemoth & I232, the new trains re-instate *some* of that push-pull dynamic, simply because they're longer. Anyone else care to geek out with me and agree/disagree with my suspicions?

I would LOVE to ride oG's Goliath with the new train design.

Personally, I think it lands more along the lines of Sheryl Crow..."Favorite Mistake". :)

I didn't know that the word mistake was used specifically about that last drop/jog left....it is especially non-B&M-like. And I can't really speak to the physics/geekiness of train design and hill shapes, but I will say with absolute conviction that the "landings" at the bottoms of the hills on the entire return-leg from the front gate area are WAYYY stronger than on any other B&M. Being a back-seat fan, the *crunchiness* of those landings is absolutely superb....it's almost like a great wooden coaster (those of you who rode HW's Legend in its original configuration remember how hard that thing used to land on the tracks). I know that's problably not good for durability of the wheels....but it's fantastic for the riders, like me, who crave intensity.

BBSpeed26 said:
Out of curiosity, what makes the oG Goliath a mistake? Just the stronger-than-typical airtime for a B&M hyper? I remember around the opening that someone rode it with either the B or the M of B&M

Had to be Walter Bolliger. Claude Mabillard has been mostly retired the last few years.

Any word regarding working with Stengel again or intensity of their rides in general?

OK, I've gotta call people out for this generalization that B&M rides aren't intense. Not only do I disagree, but there are too many of them out there to lump them together like that.

Especially when you consider the inverted coasters. Some of those Batman coasters are pretty intense.

Yeah, and Afterburn in the back of the train is way too intense for me to ride back there more than once a visit.

Not sure it was *my* opinion that made Jeff comment, LOL.

To clarify - the inverts, especially the compact layouts like B:TR, can be quite intense. The floorlesses, likewise, can be quite forceful, esp. when the ride footprint has some space limitations. My "lacks intensity" issue has historically been with the hypers...

I honestly do not think SFoG's Goliath is that airtime crazy. I much prefer Nitro, Apollo, Diamondback, etc...

Very over-rated IMO. Good ride, just not amazing.

I do not think it had that much more air than the previous generations of hypers from B&M either. Seemed about the same. The new train design and layouts of the more modern hypers though, changes are very easy to pick up on and have much more intense layouts.

I find AC at BGW, and DB at KI, to be pretty intense. Nitro, on the other hand...

I think that's the extent of my B&M Hypercoaster experience. I heard a number of comments that Golith at Canada's Wonderland and the new Intimidator at CWinds are both pretty forceful too.