New boats for Knott's Perilous Plunge

It's about time! The park has two brand-spankin'-new boats sitting in the ride's storage area. There's a new OTSR harness restraint, meaning the four-point safety belt harnesses are GONE and loading/unloading should increase two-fold, making queue waits reduce drastically!

The new boats have a very bright color scheme of blue, orange, yellow, and red. They look kind of ugly and clash with the colors of the ride's flume, but that's really nothing big.

http://www.westcoaster.net/wcPhoto.php?upd=1&image=4945

http://www.westcoaster.net/wcPhoto.php?upd=1&image=4946

Hooray! Those restraints smelled nasty! Is orange and yellow Knott's favorite color?

^ I suppose so, kind of like how red and yellow are Cedar Point's favorite colors. ;)

When is the last time Knotts built anything with a color scheme that didn't clash with the things around it?

-Nate

^ Never? Their ride colors and placements are very well executed. Rip Tide and Perilous Plunge now have the same colored vehicles, and both rides are adjacent to each other, and Boomerang (also next to Perilous Plunge) and Plunge share the same structural colors.

La Revolucion and Jaguar! share the same colors - they're adjacent to each other.

Ouch! Those restraints look exactly like the OTSR's on Revolution. If they are it could be a painful ride. *** Edited 6/9/2006 11:41:33 PM UTC by egieszl***

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kRaXLeRidAh said:
^ Never? Their ride colors and placements are very well executed.

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I guess I should rephrase the question to "When is the last time Knotts built something with colors that weren't hideous and didn't clash with each other?" The answer to that is almost certainly "never."

KBF is no place for an epileptic.

-Nate
*** Edited 6/9/2006 11:58:18 PM UTC by coasterdude318***

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egieszl said:
Ouch! Those restraints look exactly like the OTSR's on Revolution. If they are it could be a painful ride.

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Uh. Why would it be painful? On Revolution, the ride does a lot of lateral banking turns and sweeps, on the flipside - Perilous Plunge, a boat just goes down a big water chute into a big splash. No forces that would cause any kind of headbanging.

Why does one need OTSRs on a Shoot the Chutes ride?????

Oh wait its an Intamin, and oh yeah they are the only company unable to build a reliable lap bar.

Well whadya know? I was right!

http://www.coasterbuzz.com/2006-138-465404.htm

Easiest solution to the problem.

~Rob Willi

^ 2 people have died of the same reson, in different parks, on 2 different Intamin Shoot the Chutes. They both fell out of the restraints.

Here are some pics of the old restraints (wierd seat belt, look at the front right seat).

Link

This ride actully is one the rides that scares the crap out of me, look!

Link to Pic 1

Link to Pic 2

Link to Pic 3

OTSRs arent going to make you more secure though, infact most of the time they allow more movement vertical movement then lap bars do. If on Tidal Force at HP I can be safely held in by a large lap bar that only has one position then I have a hard time believing that the same thing cant protect me on PP.

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Touchdown said:
Oh wait its an Intamin, and oh yeah they are the only company unable to build a reliable lap bar.

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These two water rides are the only rides to have accidents that have led more toward the design than operator/rider failure.

I have to say, over 10 million of people have ridden the Intamin rides with their lapbars and have gotten off feeling as safe as ever (me included).

Why is it then that Intamin has resorted to putting OTSRs on all their new rides then? Its not just the STC rides, its also the S:ROS incident. One only has to look at their main compition, B&M, to see how successful lap bars can be, even in an open train.

Where has it been stated that Intamin decided to put OTSR on the new rides? The parks could very well have a say in that as well.

I wounder if it would be cheeper for Intamin to pay off all the lawsuits and deaths then it is to put OTSR on all their rides???

*** Edited 6/10/2006 4:53:19 AM UTC by Hamster Boy***

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Touchdown said:
Why does one need OTSRs on a Shoot the Chutes ride?????

Oh wait its an Intamin, and oh yeah they are the only company unable to build a reliable lap bar.

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Don't blame Intamin. Their restraint is adequate so long as the operator of the ride follows the manufacturer's operating guidelines. Blame the state of California and their ill advised safety inspectors and the ride inspection laws. They're the ones that are forcing this. I may be alone here, but I'm not entirely comfortable riding a water ride with an OTSR. I know its highily unlikely that the boat would flip over, BUT these restraints are not easing my fear of that one in a million chance. I do welcome what should be a major improvement to the operation of this ride.

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Touchdown said:
Why is it then that Intamin has resorted to putting OTSRs on all their new rides then? Its not just the STC rides, its also the S:ROS incident. One only has to look at their main compition, B&M, to see how successful lap bars can be, even in an open train.

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I think the finger points to the person paying the bill as the orgin for the OTSRs on the new rides, not the designer.

The fact is that Intamin lap bars work perfectly on 99% of the people who ride, but the design flaw is that there is too much grey area and operators have no way of knowing whether or not the larger guest should ride. (This has since been addressed by doing the senseless half-inch slack rule). The bars would be "locked down" on the guest, but that obviously doesn't mean they are restrained properly!

On any other coaster, if your bar doesn't click, you can't ride. Simple as that.

Now I'm not saying ratcheting systems are the only way, as clearly the Intamin Suspended coasters have a good design with their harnesses using the seatbelt on the side. But there has to be some sort of measurable way of locking a device to a certain threshold... something Intamin overlooked.

*** Edited 6/10/2006 10:31:03 AM UTC by Fun***

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egieszl said:

I think the finger points to the person paying the bill as the orgin for the OTSRs on the new rides, not the designer.

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Sorry I still blame Intamin, their lap bars have proven inadaquate to their buyers, even though said buyers know that most people prefer lap bars to OTSRs. Intamin should have gone back to the drawing board and designed a new lap bar, the fact that they havent even tried is why I lay the blame on them.