MF Cable Snaps Again!

S2K... it is ENTIRELY possible that duct tape was used to keep a small piece of cable from being damaged or frayed. Last season maintence men covered parts of Dragster's launch sled with duct tape to prevent it from damaging itself... every 2 runs I believe it was replaced on some days. I have also seen seatbelts on The Hurler at Paramount Carowinds with duct tape reinforcing parts of them that might be frayed, luckily that ride isn't in heavy need of a reliable seatbelt. I did, however, report the tape to the guest services.

EDIT: ^ There aren't the normal "clicky" anti-rollbacks on MF. My elementary understanding of the system is that the movement of the train uses magnets to keep the brake fins off the lift track and if the train stops moving these brakes clamp on and hold the train in place. *** Edited 5/13/2005 1:26:07 AM UTC by RollrCoastrCrazy***

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RavenTTD said:
God is punishing CP for not modifying the restraints for larger guests.

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Blame those "larger guests" for this one. All that extra weight just ripped the cable to shreds ;)

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Mark Burleson said:
The reason why the first snap on MF took so long to fix was that it tore up the station when the sled came crashing down the hill. They have since fixed that problem (you can see the sled run off track in the photo linked below).

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Mark - The catch car run off was there when the ride first opened.

S2K - It sounds rediculous but believe it. This is not the first time they've used duct tape on their rides.

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cofan101 said:
Wait I thought that there are no of the little clicks for rollbacks so if the cable snaps how come the train doesn't fall down the hill?

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There is rollback protection. There is a magnet on one of the wheels and on the rollback catch. As the wheel turns going up the hill, it lifts the catch up so there is no noise. If the train stops or rolls backwards, the catch falls down and stops the train.

It is kind of funny because someone in line Monday asked what would happen if the cable broke. The ride op said that "it can't break." I said that it did break once and he said that "Oh yea,.... it did once, but they replace it every year now so that it won't." Famouse last words.

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Jim Fisher said:
Imagine having the cable snap, and then having a thunderstorm move in before they can get you down. Sounds like a plot for a disaster film.

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Actually, it wasn't far from the scenario you described. There were two "small" thunderstorms that grazed the point on Wednesday. The incident (can't verify snap) happened shortly after the second one. The winds were high enough that the ride probably would have gone down anyway. With some of the guests up there for nearly two hours (it was almost 1 hr before they even started moving them), it had to be really cold. The temperature which was close to 70 degree dropped to almost 50 after the rain. Most people in the park were still wearing shorts.

I was checking the cams on and off today. Were TTD and MaxAir down as well? Each time I checked, the ques were empty and they were not cycling.

That would be a bummer to be there and the three majors (Two biggest coasters and new attraction) were all down.

Shaggy

There may have been high winds today. Would a giant frisbee be affected by that?

Great photos Fanatic!!!

You know I don't think I would mind being stopped on the lift....however....I think if I was sitting on the non-evac side that I would be a little nervous when I stood up to get into the evac elevator since there would be nothing but 'down' to my left.

I wonder how they do the evac procedure?

I don't think you people read carefully. The catch car detached from the train, the cable didn't snap.

Where have you read that that story is confirmed? *** Edited 5/13/2005 10:58:44 AM UTC by S2K***

It was given to Walt by CEDAR POINT....granted it was the PR department but that would be no less reliable than the news. In fact, it's probably more reliable than the news because it hasn't been spun to sound like a major disaster.

Actually, Walt said "the catchcar became detached from the train".

http://www.pointbuzz.com/news.htm?id=600

When did the cable snap?? I was at the park 7th-11th

Click on the link above.

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Mark Burleson said:
The reason why the first snap on MF took so long to fix was that it tore up the station when the sled came crashing down the hill. They have since fixed that problem (you can see the sled run off track in the photo linked below).

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That is completely incorrect. The run-off track has been there since day one. The problem with that previous break was that the cable mangled the anti-rollback notches and channel for the sled.

I think some people are just blowing this way out of poportion. Just get over it, it snaped, it get's fixed, just move on. Needless to say this isn't totally confirmed, and if it were true, then so what I mean some of you (not all) are acting like this has never happened before.

My bad on the cable snap. I could have sworn that was what happened (I remember hearing that the sled did some damage to the station, and not that it was the cable). Oh well, I guess I had it partly correct with the track damage at least.

There was no damage to the station at all. Like Jeff said, the majority of the damage was done on the lift hill. The catch car never got as far as the run-off track because the return cable got tangled up in its path.

Dont worry its running again, and it seems to be fine. I was there saturday. The problem was fixed on Friday and it has been running since.

CP handled the problem nicely and they also did a great job of keeping the rides running on a sloppy, rainy day in the park. Dick Kinzel was walking around saturday and it seemed like he was in the appropriate area, near millenium force, because i was eating and he was right there giving it a good look. So props to Cp over the weekend of doing a great job.