Dueling Inverters

Well, I'm sure that they had it rigged up with pulleys. Maybe I didn't describe the set up well enough. They have a wire attached to their seats that was then fed through the end of the boxcars when different sized weights were attached to simuate their acceleration.

Why would he feel the need to lie? As far as I know, no other B&M coaster weighs the trains as they go up the lift and position them accordingly...they don't need to because they are all single coasters. Why is it so hard to believe that Universal developed a system that weighs the trains, and then calculates the distance between them needed to send them over the hill at the right times in order for them to meet up at the correct place along the track?

It's hard to believe because it's a lot easier, safer, cheaper and pretty much in every way better to have B&M do it instead.

It's not -- especially when you're interested in developing unique technology that makes your park better than nearly every other park on the planet. It's something Disney used to do in abundance, but today Universal Creative is really where a lot of innovation takes place.

The math itself may have been done using B&M's data, but the intellectual and physical property developed to weigh the trains and determine the necessary offset is valuable to Universal because it means that no other park in the world can build dueling coasters like this and achieve the same accuracy.

I don't get what makes a Dueling invert sooooo amazing.

From the front seat of the train (if you don't mind the fiberglass obstructing your view), you get almost all of the visuals. From mid-rear to back, you get nothing but the vertical loop and almost no one gets much visual from the interlocking flat spin. Both layouts are sacrificed for the 'close encounter' moments (Ice Dragon dropping into a banked curve? Now really!) and in that respect they both feel like a compromise.

I rode DD several times over a couple days, then Montu, then DD again. I'd rather have an all-out single track experience than a half-witted course that duels any day.

-'Playa

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CoastaPlaya said:

I'd rather have an all-out single track experience than a half-witted course that duels any day.

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Agreed. However, this is just one of the sucky things about being an enthusiast - you know better.

Joe Tourist making a pilgimage to Orlando for the "once in a lifetime" theme park spendfest basically craps his britches at the very idea - let alone the concept in practice.

Little 11 year old Jimmy from Wisconsin who's only trip to Orlando was last summer for a theme park extravaganza will talk about the damn thing until he's dead.

These are the people this ride was made for.

I do think that Fire could hold it's own as a stand alone coaster - Ice on the other hand is a joke without the "duel".

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CoasterFanMatt said:
Before all these posts clarified that he was talking about B&M inverted coasters, I seriously thought he was wondering about alternate layouts for Chance inverters. I'm not sure if its possible for this thread to make less sense, but that certainly had me confused. :)

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Actually, there are dueling chance inverters :)
http://www.rides.com/inverter_dbhome.html

I always thought of those rides as a race to see which side could put its riders to sleep first, not so much as a duel...

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CoastaPlaya said:
From mid-rear to back, you get nothing but the vertical loop and almost no one gets much visual from the interlocking flat spin.
-'Playa

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Sitting towards the back of Fire’s train, if you happen to glance down you can see Ice flying through the zero-g. Not sure about you, but I thought that was pretty cool.

Actually if I had to guess, I would say most people don’t even notice the dueling much, if at all.

I think the on-ride visuals are probably only half the rent on DD.
The whole idea of this cool coreography of the two coasters swirling around each other is such a great unique stroke of genius concerning themeing, off-ride visuals and just the pure phantasies that the ride creates - the roaring of the trains alone.You can almost see and hear the dragons really fight.

It's not an attraction that's centered around the perspective of the rider, its more about the overall coherence of the entire installation - I think DD as a whole is somewhat of a unique art piece. If you discard the concept however and strip it down just to the pure subjective experience you have on ride, there are probably better coasters.

superman has the right idea. I doubt that the Dragons were ever intended to be stand-alone top tier coasters. This entire discussion is really trying to make two coasters be something they never were intended to be. There's a lot of generalization that goes on, and people see an inverted coaster with mega-theme and immediately try to place it among the Montu's, Talons, and Raptors of the world. But as superman said, its a work of art. It's as much fun to sit outside the ride and watch as it is to take a slow walk through the castle as it is to actually ride on the coasters themselves. This is one attraction where the coasters (and its riders) are secondary to the entire package. I would even argue half the rent's a little much!

Brett - who was impressed by Ice Dragon as well for what it is; not for what I thought it should be.

I've only done three duelers (Twisted Sisters being the third) but Gwazi was the only one I'd consider good enough to stand alone. Not that it was a top 5 woodie, but the speed and the laterals at least made it very interesting.

-'Playa

I've said it before, and I guess I'm saying it again...the dueling/racing aspect is as cool (prob. even moreso) for the non-riders who only hang out and watch the coasters while the rest of their family rides...a well-timed duel or race makes the whole *experience* really shine through.

Specific to DD, from any seat, I never thought the interlocked zero-g rolls provided much visually ON THE RIDE in the way of dueling, but for the spectators, it's quite a sight....

Maddie: I don't doubt that Universal came up with the idea or the implementation of the weighing mechanism.

However, my understanding was that B&M calculates all the speeds and timings for trains of all weights when they're designing the layout in the first place, so the "algorithm" would pretty much be hardwiring the calculations already done by B&M into a processor and sticking in the appropriate values as the trains are weighed.

This is such an interesting topic. By the way, does anybody know what equipment is used to weigh the trains? I'm very curious to hear the answer on that.

-Brian

Look in the US Patent office. ;) I have no idea other than that you should find it in there somewhere.

Why would you believe we have it here?

lata, jeremy

--who sometimes cant believe all the crap that makes it here and the gems that dont...

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Wolfhound said:
This is such an interesting topic. By the way, does anybody know what equipment is used to weigh the trains? I'm very curious to hear the answer on that.

-Brian

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The easiest method I can think of is to measure the tension on the lift chain. I'm not sure if that is the method they actually use.

Its surprising how misleading patents can be however. That particular patent also references rides that Universal had absolutely nothing to do with like HP Lightning Racer and BGT Gwazi. It makes you wonder....

-Brian