Mitch's Wood Coaster Poll - Results

Ajrides said:
Unless you are blind or just the dumbest person on the planet you can see that ET is very much made of wood, in fact there is more wood on ET than on Voyage.

So is Gemini and any number of Arrow "steel" coasters built with wood support structures. Are you blind or stupid too? Don't be a jerk.

Milled track offers similar precision to steel construction (welded or bolted together, doesn't matter). That level of precision results in more control over the ride. A solid piece of wood cut to precise tolerances has far more in common with steel coaster track than the traditional laminated wood tracking that has been used for the last hundred years.

If you want to debate the merits and categorization of the two techniques, knock yourself out, but if you're going to be an ass about it, go post on some other site.

Jeff - Editor - CoasterBuzz.com - My Blog

^^GCII's in Europe... ;)

"Bringin' the International to GCII". :)

edit: The webmaster messed up my arrows....LOL!

In general, GCII coasters are smooth. Toro was the smoothest wooden I've been on other than Stricker's Teddy Bear and L-A-M-A's Meteor....both *kiddie* coasters. The laminated track-bed is clearly a different animal the the old layered 2x6s. *** Edited 12/7/2007 3:58:50 PM UTC by rollergator***

Am I wrong in thinking Intamin wood track is laminated as well? I thought the only difference was it was done in a factory and shipped in sections to the site. From looking at it, it certainly looks like a bunch of laminated wood with plates of steel on the top and sides.

Thunderbird's position on the list spells good things for SFStL visitors next year.

While wood coasters have remained pretty much the same for close to a century, let's not forget that side-friction figure-eight coasters like Leap-The-Dips have very little in common with the ones we know and love, yet are still referred to as wood coasters. There was a point in time when someone (John Miller) came up with a new way of building coasters. There was obviously a point in time when Intamin did the same thing.

Rides like El Toro and Balder aren't built exactly like common wood coasters but the main difference in the construction is that the track is custom-milled by machine at an off-site location rather than by skilled laborers assembling wood laminates on the actual job site. Other than that, the big difference is the use of poly wheels instead of steel wheels, which is probably more significant that anything else.

A steel coaster uses I-beams or tubular steel for the track. A wood coaster uses wood underneath a strip of steel. It's that simple.

Also, is there anything preventing the use of poly wheels on a "traditional" wood coaster like, say, Mean Streak?

^^Comparing Intamin's laminated track-bed to John Miller's upstops is....well...disrespectful. ;)

I think the point is that El Toro is made out of wood but it doesn't necessarily perform the way some people want wooden coasters to perform.

I personally haven't ridden El Toro yet like I said, but if it truly rides as similarly to a steel coaster as some people say, it's not going to be able to touch my top wooden coasters. Not anywhere close. And that has nothing to do with what it's truly made of, just how it feels.

Lest we forget the intamins run on poly lined wheels?

Chuck, makes it more a under engineered steelie IMHO

Intamin did put their trains on the RCCA built, Stengel designed "Coaster Express" at Parque Warner Madrid. You'd imagine that with the poly wheel and Intamin seats and lap bars, it would be a good ride. Sadly, that ride is horrible, basically a mini Son of Beast (huge helixes, no airtime).

How will you consider Mammut, opening in Germany next year? Designed by Stengel, built by Cordes (the company that does the "prefab" part of the woodies and trains and hardware by... Gerstlauer. So, no poly wheels here! *** Edited 12/7/2007 4:16:48 PM UTC by Absimilliard***

Well El Toro looks like a wood coaster....But it most definitely doesnt ride like a wood coaster, and it doesnt smell like a wood coaster....It was fun, smooth, enjoyable...but definitely missed something that I find appealing in wood coasters....

Zero G Thrills

I get what you're all saying about El Toro not replicating the experience of a traditional wood coaster, I'm just saying I do believe it fair to rate Intamin's new wood coasters as we've rated all wood coasters in the past. If polling was around in the early part of the 20th century, I don't think it would have been necessary to exclude "new" wood coasters from all the side-friction coasters that were in operation.

Let's not even get into the issue of SFMM's Colossus, whose steel I-beam tracks make it even less of a wood coaster than El Toro! ;)

I can actually see El Toro coming off the list sooner or later. It has just gotten really rough over the past year. It's sad to say, but it is not aging well.

RIDE ON!

Absimilliard said:
Intamin did put their trains on the RCCA built, Stengel designed "Coaster Express" at Parque Warner Madrid. You'd imagine that with the poly wheel and Intamin seats and lap bars, it would be a good ride. Sadly, that ride is horrible...

So does that mean it's not just the poly wheels? It's probably more the precision engineering done on the track?

^Well, poly wheels on traditional track probably get *destroyed* - esp. considering it's RCCA.

I'm just saying I do believe it fair to rate Intamin's new wood coasters as we've rated all wood coasters in the past.

Agreed.

So I wonder why Inta-Ride is going with standard layered track on their new woodie and Gerstlauer Gen 2 woodie trains????

COST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Question: Will Knoebels' Flying Turns be a part of next years wood coaster poll? Answer: Yes.

Just like the Mack and Intamin bobsled coasters are part of the steel poll, yet they are so much different than typical steel coasters. Why the aversion to the new generation of woodies? They're obviously wooden coasters, yet because of how they're constructed, people dismiss them as being practically steel. What similarities do the wooden bobsled coasters have to traditional woodies? Very few...yet I've never heard anyone argue that they're not wood.

We all know 'wood' or 'steel' coasters are defined by the material the actual track is made of.

matt. said:
I think the point is that El Toro is made out of wood but it doesn't necessarily perform the way some people want wooden coasters to perform.

Exactly. Granted, I felt weird after riding El Toro, and I couldn't bring myself to place it in the top spot despite the fact that it totally kicked my ass in the best way possible. It didn't perform the way a wooden coaster is 'supposed' to. But who cares? It's almost as if people feel El Toro doesn't deserve to be in the same class. I don't get it.

Parker17 said:
I can actually see El Toro coming off the list sooner or later. It has just gotten really rough over the past year. It's sad to say, but it is not aging well.

So wood coaster purists should feel right at home then!

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eightdotthree said:
Parker17 said:
I can actually see El Toro coming off the list sooner or later. It has just gotten really rough over the past year. It's sad to say, but it is not aging well.
So wood coaster purists should feel right at home then!

I still thought the very front and back were as smooth as steel this year, however, the middle was headache-inducing like Son of Beast used to be, and downright un-rideable in those sections!! Just like a bad wood coaster...

Toro was no less than 20 million and Voyage at 7-8 million They could retrack Voyage every year for the next hundred years for the difference.

Chuck, who says this has no bearing on the Wood-Steel but the cost is significant deterent, If Intamin was the answer CF would have chose them, Instead they chose GCII which remarkably has several agressive coasters out there with virtually no track work in over 5 years.