Hulk - who's actually doing the track

I am reasonably certain that the new ride will have different restraints. I had heard they even experimented by bolting a non-OTSR seat to one of the old trains.

So what looked like additions to footers were actually concrete saws. It was easy to miss the gaps around the teeth at the bottom of the saws. With how they're positioned (with a good gap around the outside edges), it looks like they'll be coring out the bolts and re-pouring the middles. I'm surprised that's something they'd do, but I suppose as long as the concrete cures correctly it would be fine. If they weren't planning to reuse them they'd just be ripping them out like they did with some in the back half.

Jeff said:

Whether or not there is a marketing angle may be unimportant if they simply felt that the ride had reached a point where it was mechanically in need of replacement. We don't really know.

Quoting myself is weird, I know, but I have it on good authority that this was very much an issue of having an end of service life. Apparently track repairs were pretty much a daily occurrence. It sounds like no other B&M ride has even come close to logging the same number of service hours. That's 16 years with no significant down time. Compare that to a ride like Raptor, which has maybe 170 operating days per year, and opening in 1994, still hasn't crossed the 10 year milestone. It does make you wonder about the condition of the ride in another 10 years. Also makes you think about the Busch Tampa rides, though they aren't run nearly as hard as Hulk was.

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Hulk had run twice as many cycles as Kumba, despite the age difference. The difference in the intervals for both rides is likely night and day, with Hulk always running at least 2 trains (but usually always 3) where Kumba seems to run with 1, maybe 2 much more often. Then add in how fast the crews at Hulk send trains out vs. Kumba. I'd be curious to know the cycle comparison to each of the Dragons as well, since one train op on each side happens often enough.

For Dragons, 1 train goal was 15 dispatches an hour, 2 was 30 dispatches, and 3 was 45. There were a lot of factors that went into if we hit the mark or not, but generally the crew could be within 2-3 dispatches no sweat as long as nothing went wrong.

So an average of 300 dispatches per day x an almost 6000 open days is 1.8 million dispatches.Wow

I wonder if they keep up with daily total riders .Even if all trains not full they have to be close to 50 million individual rides ?

Anything new on the development of the Hulk?

Last thing I heard was that there was track sighting in the ohio plant. Methinks its only a matter of time before we start seeing cranes to erect the new track.

Will they ship track from Ohio with salt on the road? Or do they usually ship whenever, not worrying about road salt? Obviously snow or rain aren't issues...

What difference does it make? You think they can just let stuff start piling up all winter?

So far we haven't needed any salt on the road here in Ohio. Maybe a little bit of brine, but it's all washed away.

^ yeah, it's been mostly warm here. In fact, I can picture them shipping out before the effects of El Niño go away.

Jeff said:
What difference does it make? You think they can just let stuff start piling up all winter?

I know you've been in FL for a little while now and forgotten the effects road salt has on bare metal... Same thing happened to my father in-law when he moved south. Yeah I know the pieces are painted but I think I remember seeing the ends where the track butts together is usually bare.

True, it has been really warm so far. But we all know that can change any day.

If the steel is so fragile that it would be compromised by one ride over salted roads, it probably won't hold up as long as the track that was just demolished.

It isn't bare metal, it's painted, all sides. The ends use only the primer since there's no point spending money on paint no one will ever see. That stuff was rolling up I-75 all winter in 2013.

Yeah, some exposure to road salt or brine for a few hours isn't going to be much compared to the daily beating of having a huge greasy multi-ton coaster trains beating the steel up every 2 minutes. In the Florida sun.

And if it did, just put a tarp on it.

Can't help but laugh what the conversation has turned into here. Can you imagine your average park guest waiting in line and thinking: "I hope all the new track pieces were protected from the road grime during delivery!"

Fair enough.

Salt can't be washed off... nope... can't happen... Or maybe they could put some sort of protective barrier, like a tarp or wrap or something... hmm. ;)

ShaneDenmark said:

I know you've been in FL for a little while now and forgotten the effects road salt has on bare metal... Same thing happened to my father in-law when he moved south. Yeah I know the pieces are painted but I think I remember seeing the ends where the track butts together is usually bare.

True, it has been really warm so far. But we all know that can change any day.

The ends of the rails actually have plates bolted on to protect them during shipment. I remember seeing them on Gatekeeper track on the truck and sitting in the lot at CP.

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