Off-ride video shots of world's only "lap-bar" free fall tower

...which also happens to be the tallest!

Lex Luthor Drop of Doom has a lap-bar restraint system (engaged from overhead) as opposed to other drop tower rides that utilize a snug over-shoulder harness restraint.

This should allow for greater freedom of upper body movement during the ride and some seriously nasty airtime during the 5-second plunge back to earth.

Cool compilation of 1080p HD quality helicopter overhead footage of the ride in action from Media Day (Friday July 6) -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Xst6xgV7Eo

You'll probably notice right away that unlike the CGI promo video released, the gondola does not actually reach the very pinnacle of the 415' structure (due to top pulleys having to be mounted at within the structure at 400'; and also accounting for the catch car).

Some of the faces are hillarious! This ride just looks sexy. Can not wait to ride this.

Here is a video with pretty much the same footage, but it includes a onride from beginning to end, including the awsome sound f/x on top of the ride.

http://youtu.be/B0p9iMSjuW8

I have no desire to ride this.

I must say though, it does look cool though with the coaster running at the same time.

It looks like Intamin put a lapbar very similar to the Thighcrush restraints on this ride. I am hoping this is not the future of their ride restraints. I'll never ride an Intamin again!

I want to meet the idiot mechanic who gets assigned to check the ride daily. I think this rides lifespan will be much less then the 1st generation free falls.

Haha...that looks like an absolute blast!

Agent Johnson said:
I want to meet the idiot mechanic who gets assigned to check the ride daily. I think this rides lifespan will be much less then the 1st generation free falls.

Epic troll, brah. Lolololol. Oh, you were being serious?

That helicopter footage is stellar, especially seeing both the drop ride and coaster falling simultaneously. And the on-ride cameras really give perspective of just how long the freefall sensation is. Cool stuff.

I've never been a true fanatic of drop rides (that is to say that they aren't necessarily must rides when I'm at a park), but I have to admit every one I've ridden has been really fun, including the shorter ones (always liked Demon Drop, but I've also ridden a second generation Intamin at SFA that's only 140 feet). They're so short, but that 3 or 4 seconds can be the most adrenaline-filled 3 or 4 seconds of the day.

Lex Luthor looks great...and yeah, not sure where Agent Johnson's comment is coming from. Left field?

While I agree that the footage from the helicopter is fantastic, I wish they wouldn't have timed the drop ride with Superman every single time. It's cool, but overkill. Hopefully, it's not going to do that off-camera.

The footage really is great though.

And on the retail side, I see muchos dollars coming from clean underware sales. Thats a ride that creates a whole new element of fear.

Just a small point of fact, here. There are quite a few free falls in Europe with lap bars. Admittedly they're a lot smaller though - fifty feet or so.

This one looks rather fun.

This is b-roll footage for Newscast around the World to use, nobody besides us will see the entire 4 minutes. Of course the park will show off these 2 amazing rides as in the actual broadcast you might get 20 seconds of that..

In day to day operations it will be different of course, you might get lucky having superman "defending" Lex Luther but that is besides the point here.

From the responses I got so far is that this ride is very intimidating at first, but once you done it, you want to do it all over again and again and again...

Looks like a big hit for the mountain..

What I like the most about this project is that the Park took a tower that most of us (back in 2005/6) would have said to just tear it down, but instead invested some $ over a couple of years in it and look at it now...

That is an incredible acomplishment as Magic Mountain not only made that tower relevant again, but the center of attention(which is quite hard to do with X2 and Tatsu at the same park)

Looks awesome.

I too noticed that they held them up there till they sent the Superman cars and they both came down together. I wonder if that is the way it will be or just for the photo shoot?

It was just for the B-roll shoot. They did the same thing last year with the Superman re-boot, launching both cars at the same time.

It will be totally by accident if you get a ride like that on a normal day. I think it would be even more fun to have Superman shoot up the tower as you're on your way up on Lex. Freaky!

Agent Johnson said:

I want to meet the idiot mechanic who gets assigned to check the ride daily. I think this rides lifespan will be much less then the 1st generation free falls.

The dept. manager is going to want the person who can get to the top the fastest (I was asked this question by a lead mechanic concerning a certain Von Roll skytower as a requirement for employment).

An odd question, but do you think the ride has some sort of automatic e-stop in the event of an earthquake?

I was just thinking that ride would be REALLY scary if you were going up and an earthquake occurred.

And yes, I know there is no e-stop once the catch car says 'goodbye'.

It's been a long time since I was at Magic Mountain, but I recall the tower slightly swaying when Superman launches. I wonder to what extent riders on Lex Luther can feel that?

I would hope it doesn't e-stop, as I'd hate to be stuck 400 feet in the air during an earthquake. Just let me down, thanks.

^ Yeah, I'd need a new pair of Underoos if that ever happened. Even more embarrassing for the commandos up there.

mlnem4s said:

It's been a long time since I was at Magic Mountain, but I recall the tower slightly swaying when Superman launches. I wonder to what extent riders on Lex Luther can feel that?

The tower can sway up to 2' in either direction when the Superman vehicles go up the tower.