Powder Keg Spike

What is this spike for.

http://www.midwestinfoguide.com/silver/111604/2.jpg

There's a lot of discussion in the Powder Keg thread....the feeling seems to be it's part of the anti-rollback system.

Seems S&S is trying a lot of odd ideas on this one. For starters, after departing from the station, the train rolls onto a transfer track that moves the train sideways onto the launch segment. One thought was this was just for dramatic effect, but it was also proposed that it was done as a safety device. In the event of a roll back, with the use of this transfer track there is no possible way for the train to roll back and hit another train in the station. So this way, if there is a roll back, it safely comes to a stop by the prelaunch brakes and if for some reason the prelaunch breaks fail or don't completly stop the train, they have this reverse spike to let the train roll safely to a stop.

That's about the only expectation I can give. There are still quite a few "whys" that could be answered...Intamin get's away just fine with just prelaunch brakes, why can't S&S? Could the transfer track be just to align the train with the already built hill from Buzzsaw Falls that they are reuseing? And so on and so forth...

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Coaster Lover said: Could the transfer track be just to align the train with the already built hill from Buzzsaw Falls that they are reuseing? And so on and so forth...

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It has been stated in the Powderkeg thread that the Buzzsaw lift hill is NOT what is being launched into. There will be a hill after the launch, and then later in the ride the train will be chain-lifted up the Buzzsaw hill, into the dragon-whatever turn, and then hit the brakes.

If this spike idea is a true, a rollback might not be as lame as other launched coasters. At least it would give you something different.

What if during the ride a rollback is part of the normal ride (due to "faulity old timey machinery") and is used to freak people out?

Also

Let's continue this thread in the ALREADY ESTABLISHED PowderKeg thread. We don't really need two.

I think the spike is there for roll-backs too, BUT I think that every roll back it will go slightly up the spike since I don't think there is a huge breakrun on the launch like TTD.

It has already been established, thanks to Swoosh's conversation with park officials, that the back spike is a back-up safety device should brakes fail during a roll-back.

You can find an ongoing discussion in this thread.

mOOSH

Ok then. Let's keep it in the other thread. :)