I-305 major change?

The only thing new about I-305 is the support structure for the lift hill, as far as I can tell.

If I were to pay someone ten or twenty million dollars for a roller coaster that will attract customers to my park, they better deliver what I advertise. Customer satisfaction is not something to take lightly.

rollergator said:
Andy's point is completely valid, and makes me wonder if Sandor could ever get a job at HW...

Intamin did have a job at HW, Pilgrims Plunge. I was told directly by someone very high up at HW that they were not happy and would not consider them for future installations.

LOL, yeah, we're on top of all that - I was referring to Andy's statement about overpromising and under-delivering... ;)

Think about what you could do with all that money - you could build a Mind Bender, a double racing Phoenix, and a Hades (and maintain that Hades as well) :)

Or, you could invest in a large, shiny ride that attracts a lot of attention.

From the I305 page on Facebook:

Happy New Year! Ring in 2011 by watching this Onride/Offride POV of Intimidator 305, exculsive to our Facebook fans, with its new, more comfortable first turn! Prepare to be Intimidated.
Created with NoLimits Rollercoaster Simulation.

Ummm...whatever.

Guess they're putting the trims back to the original placement. Lame.

If that video is to be believed, the turn persists for nearly 8 seconds. Eight! The no-trim version looks like it was under 5 seconds. Raptor's entire helix isn't even 8 seconds. I know it's hard to say how true a NL sim of the ride will be, but I'm interested to see how well this change is accepted.

"Meh" ;-)

I can't wait to push "H" for help.

Ok, so lets say that the 2.0 version now has a larger radius at the bottom of the drop and the trim is removed off the drop. I cant help but think there will still be a problem with greying/blacking out. Would anyone agree that the duration of time the ridders will be under the positive G-force will still be high?

Sustained g-forces aren't always bad or uncomfortable -- look at Mission: Space at Epcot. The issue with I-305 is that the g-forces on that turn were too high for most riders to tolerate. By increasing the radius of the turn, they'll be bringing the forces down to a point that's more tolerable to the body, and at that point the increased time spent in the turn isn't a big deal.

I'm sure someone could do the math, but I'd love to know the difference in G's. I guess to do that, we'd need to know the radius, before and after.

Here is a calculator for determining the G's. A rough estimate of the initial radius (measured using the ruler on Google Earth) is approximately 137 ft. This gives 4.34 G's at 94 mph.

Did they ever advertise the maximum positive G-Force for the ride? That turn sure didn't feel as powerful as 4+ G's to me. It was just that it lasted so long that it got to me at the last second. Mission Space felt more powerful to me.

I am very curious to see how effective this all will be.. If you go from 5 seconds at 4.5G's to 8 seconds at 4G's it will still be rough on many people. But who knows.

Now if they made the radius much larger *and* made it increase in elevation like an upward helix, they could increase the duration while decreasing the G forces at the same time (while keeping the maximum speed at the bottom of the drop). I think, making it a bit more easy on the rider.

^I figured it was an uninspired design from the get-go. Unless you like neck popping transitions, as it were.

The best ground hugging fast curve I can think of is on the Whizzer at Great America :) But I am biased to that ride.

I wanted an uphill helix style turn solution soooo bad, because I thought it would be the best way to keep the G forces down, but I'm no engineer, so whatever... :)

^Hey, I was an engineer! Anyone want my degree? It's framed, I'll give it to you real cheap!

Are there any updates as to the construction? The ride looks kinda bland, no scenery, tunnels, etc. How bout some light-ring or something?

Am I mistaken or does the first drop twist now?