Great theme for new Rocket Coasters

I've never really understood the whole 'Drag Racing' theme that seems to always be associated with Rocket Coasters/TA2K.
(Okay, 'always' is a little strong as there's only 4 in existence...) It just seems silly to have a car theme on a ride that goes up (and down) at a 90 degree angle.
So watching coverage of the war the other night, I had a most brilliant brainstorm...
theme a Rocket Coaster to an Aircraft carrier!
It's a natural fit. Picture the station built to look like the carrier itself, you enter the structure at 'sea level' and wait in line in the corridors of the ship. Winding you way through the halls you eventually emerge onto the deck of the ship, where your 'Aircraft' is waiting (Wouldn't require any more theming work to the cars than TTD has)
You enter the jet fighter and move into the launch position, from where you're propelled into 'the Wild Blue Yonder'. You do some elements and return to your carrier unscathed.
It could work with either an Xcelerator or TTD style layout (though a combo would be nice... vertical tower, 280 twist on the way back down, sweeping turns and then re-enter the station for the rear.
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Pun is the death of wit.

I love the drag racing (dragster)/ hot rod xcelerator theme. Cheaper to accomplish than your idea, cute license plates on the cars (pdl2mdl & 2fast4u on xcerator). I'm open to new themes though.

Perhaps you mean a 270 twist.

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Well, I used to be able to see TTD from my house, then I moved.
Life's not fair.

You could do a 280 degree twist. It would just require a little different turn around.

Back on topic though, I had a similar idea. I thought that the "pilots" would face forward and the "gunners" would face backwards. The downside to this would be throughput. I don't think that you could create a train that would look right for the theme, and that would mean two or four passengers per launch. That would mean a lot of corridors on that carrier.

I always thought that a racing version of TTD or Xcelerator would be fun. A bit on the expensive side for the park, but it would seem to be a natural thing for all of the racing concepts associated with this ride.

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The Trip: CP, SFWoA, PKI, KW, HW, IB, SFGAm, MiA and LeSourdsville too.
8 Days- 10 parks. May 2003

How about a rocket coaster that's themed to *gasp* a rocket? It could even have a vertical launch. I would also like to see a full length rocket coaster (at least a minute and a half excluding down time).

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Purple cows eat silver moon pies, among fiesty, glowing fireflies.

You want original: heres original one word: Superman ;)

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I don't care what anyone says, Magnum is better then Millenium Force.

Top Gun: TJC at Carowinds has that theme - even complete with a model aircraft in the middle.

You're forgetting, SquishyMon, that the 2-minute or so average of "normal" coasters is only achieved with a large amount of lift hill. A rocket coaster with (proportionately) the same lengeth of circuit and speed as a traditional coaster would still be a lot shorter. Think Premier or Vekoma LIM Spaghetti Bowls.

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I hear America screaming...

If it can be imagined, the Swiss can build it.

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Purple cows eat silver moon pies, among fiesty, glowing fireflies.

rolacoastaking, you'd die from the g's riding a rocket coaster backwards, or get seriously injured.

Why not theme it to Wylie Coyote? Make the train look like a Acme rocket, I can see Six Flags doing that!
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www.answersingenesis.org

I like the idea. I also think that time travel might be another cool theme. You are launched, up the tower, down, then back in time.

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Love,
The Mole

I had that idea and even made a Hyper Rails file of my idea. Not only to blast off from the carrier with a hydraulic-type launch, but incorporate full effects such as smoke and such. At the MCBR, a puff of smoke would accompany a model "enemy" fighter which would damage your fighter, and the second half of the coaster is bunny hills and corkscrews and other "out of control" maneuvers as opposed to the huge sweeping Stengel Dives and 180' airtime hills in the first half. Yea, I thought it was a cool idea, I started sketching it about a year and a half ago and only put it into Hyper Rails recently. If you'd like to see the track layout, its in Coasterbuzz games somewhere (probably about 2 months old)

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P! I! T! T! P...I...T...T...P-I-T-T Let's Go PITT!!
-- Brett

Well, it looks like my idea was ahead of its time... but only by a week
This was just posted on the new interactive rides web site

http://www.interactiverides.com/pages/Coasters.html#
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Pun is the death of wit.

Since Paramount's already owns the Top Gun name, perhaps you'll see this at Carowinds next year! ;)

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"It's not a Too-mah!" - Arnold after riding Batman the Ride

nice ride theme designer, only one flaw that i could think of: rocket coasters need a straight down hill break run, and when an aircraft lands on a aircraft carrier, they usually come in a straight line. Other than that, it looks awesome
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UK, home to the King of Inverts, Nemesis, and the soon Heir, Inferno

have any of you ever thought of on a rocket coaster that after the 2nd over banked turn like on xcelerator, you go over a huge hill over the staion and then another overbanked turn like the one on millenium force but mirrored. then it would hit the brakes. that would add time and a heck of a lot of airtime!

I don't think rocket coasters really have as much constraint as you are all suggesting. I think, as with everything, that it's just a matter of how much the park is willing to invest. Beyond the initial launch, I don't see how the trains and tracks are physically and structurally any different from any other coaster ride. In that manner, they should be able to do whatever inversions, airtime hills, and braking systems are required for the job the park wants done!

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P! I! T! T! P...I...T...T...P-I-T-T Let's Go PITT!!
-- Brett

The ULTIMATE Experiment:

Take the train from WT and place it on the track of TTD. "The world's first `Impulse-Strata Coaster!`" What do you think? It may be a tad bit extreme, but what a thrill!

What do you say CP? I propose that you go ahead and conduct the experiment. While your at it, Take one of the trains from MF and place it on the track of WT!

Before I get bashed on this idea, any volunteers willing to ride?

P.S. ~ Have Mantis and Raptor trade off trains as well!

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YOUNGSTOWN 2010
*** This post was edited by jkpark 4/10/2003 8:53:46 PM ***