Roughness of Classic Wooden Coasters

TX Giant @ SFOT was great the first 5/6 years of its existence-but man, today it's nothing but a torture device.

Wow! I'm very suprised Villain didn't make it's way on here. Then again it's not a classic. I agree though the Racer has seen better days in the smooth dept. Am I the only one on here that likes Mean Streak?

I wonder if M&V will be called in to do their magic on some of the Paramount woodies, much as they did on Blue Streak, Shivering Timbers, & all three GL woodies??

I still remember the Comet back before it got the lock-down lap bars. It used to just have the bars that went down halfway no matter how big you were.

You used to get major air on that ride when the lap bar didn't staple you down. But that would be the case with most wooden coasters.

^^I don't know if even their services can be of any help when it comes to the two Hurlers.

Gotta agree with the fact that WO,for it's age runs really well what with the maintainence budget SFA has to work with but what astounds me is that the same can't be said for Roar & it's only been around for 8 complete seasons just about to begin it's 9th.

Crobie, I'll agree with you on the Villian. I love the Mean Streak (call me insane), but the villian was rougher than hell. As for woodies, in my book, a good woodie is supposed to beat you up a bit. Some people say Magnum is rough, but it it isn't. Rough all depends on yout definition.

Since we JUST got into semantics on the other thread...

"Adult" wooden coasters should "jostle" you, they should be INTENSE. I would NEVER say they should have *roughness*.

Voyage, Hades, TX Giant, Rampage, Ghostie, J2, TrEmOrS, etc. Intense? Oh yeah! Rough? Not really.

Sonny, HC5, Herc....THOSE are/were rough...IMO.

Seemed to me that Comet rode much better earlier in the year, which made me hopeful, but later in the season the brakes were much more noticeable.

Even without brakes, I don't know how much airtime you'd get. Between the rather short seat belts and seat dividers, all you're likely to get is the sound of denim rubbing up and down against the dividers. Kinda sounding like Wildcat's brakes. :)

If it's all about how well a coaster is "maintained", how do we explain Legend's sluggish performance the last few years?

Did the king of "all things wooden" slip up?
I don't care how well you maintain a poorly built car, your going to have problems with it as it ages.

I'm not saying this is the case here but a lot of people confuse "rough" with "intense" and "aggressive". IMO, a wood coaster is supposed to throw you around a bit, whether it be out of your seat like Phoenix and Boulder Dash or from side to side like Thunderhawk and Coney's Cyclone. If I want something smooth, I'll take a steel coaster. But just because a wood coaster throws you around doesn't always mean it's rough. The Voyage is a coaster that throws you around but it's not rough, just powerful beyond words.

Age doesn't really have anything to do with a coaster being rough. New rides like Villain often ride like you'd expect and old coaster to ride, while old rides like Hershey's Comet ride like they were built last year. It all depends on how well a given park takes care of its rides. Knoebels, Kennywood, Holiday World, Lake Compounce and Hershey know what to do and how to do it. Parks like SFMM, SFNE and Kings Island either don't know, or don't care.

DWeaver, Considering I had one rough and lackluster ride on Legend and one very good one within a couple hours of each others on Labor Day. Im not so sure it isn't the trains. I being a coaster geek intentionally took the A Train after the first ride in the B train. The difference was night and day. Not quite old SRM Insane but still very good.

As far as Legend being greased to the gills the whole length. I think them days are over with Two train op. NO WAY THEIR TAKING A CHANCE! and therefore it doesn't get the massive grease from the helix on anymore, Just wear and friction spots. (THIS IS SPECULATION ON MY PART and not FACT)

I know Legend is getting some work this winter. I'll be willing to be a test pilot on my former #1 and still top #5 :)

See you at HWN's

Chuck, who also says I went to a Timbersfest once where the Blue train just blew the Green train away as far as ride quality.

Ok I got the crap beaten out of me on Texas Giant, Georgia Cyclone, and Psyclone and they pretty much ruined wooden coasters for me until I rode Roar with the Millinieum flyers and my faith was renewed but I am a fan of older wooden coasters like Judge Roy Scream and Colosuss(they arent great but a few great rides changed my mind).

Many of you are saying that if you want a smooth ride, you would choose a steel coaster. I find this theology to be somewhat biased. I mean, with steel you also are including SLC's, Boomerangs, Arrow Corkskrews and Mega Distasters (loopers), AND those *things* that Pinifari seems to come up with. You do have B&M's and Intamins for steel coasters, but you also have GCI (+ MFlyers), TGG, and new Intamin woodies. They equal out if you think hard about it.........

I'm glad that my other homepark's ( I'd like to think ;) ) Wooden coaster hasn't made this list. The Lakeside Cyclone. It has been aging well IMO.

One reason why the KI Racer may get less wear on the backward side is because they often run two trains on the forward side and only one on the backward side. The same would be expected for Rebel Yell at KD which has the same type of operations.

Georgia Cyclone used to be quite the ride, and without the trim brake, it flew.

Blame poor maintenance on that one. Its sad. If they did some retracking, it could be brought back to its former glory.

Nowadays, it shuffles leaving the station. Thats when you know somethings wrong.

This topic and the ensuing debate comes up once a year at least. As usual some people are confusing the terms rough and intense.

As I see it [and hopefully CPunk can back me up here] roughness -- when discussing wooden coasters -- is due to two factors: quality of construction and on-going maintenance of both structure and trains. Poor constuction can result in shuffling and/or washboarding [aka jackhammering] even when a coaster is well-maintained. Conversely roughness can also be a problem if a well-constructed coaster or it's trains are not properly maintained.

Intensity is not shuffling or potholes or jackhammering. Intensity comes from horizontal and vertical g-forces, both positive and negative, that are the result of the ride's design. The cross-over hill on El Toro, the "drop" on Raven, or the reverse-bunny on Hades are good examples of an intense [but not rough] moments. Those intense moments could get rough if the parks do not maintain the rides.

Not sure how steel coasters are germane to the discussion of wood coaster roughness.

Charles, Legend seems to be suffering some of the same "midlife" issues as Ghostrider (sluggish and rough), and they are two very similarly built coasters.

Is it coincidence? I find that hard to believe given the drastic difference in their owner's maintenance strategy. Then again, Knotts does seem to care for Ghostie, so perhaps your right about the trains.

Why does Raven run so impeccably year after year, yet Legend is so inconsistent?

My first ride was on the Texas Giant in 1995 about 5yrs after it opened.I remembered thinking that I just loved the sheer intensity of the ride while my friend's back paid a price.Being an experienced rider,I knew what to expect and rode accordingly.Sad to hear it is just torture these days.A great looking exploded twister that was great in it's heyday unlike it's sister exploded twister Mean Streak which never lived up to it's looks.

Good definition Moosh!

I agree with both. There's this notion that if a coaster is overly rough, the park's maintenance dept is always to blame. But if a coaster isn't built correctly from the beginning, it's going to have major issues REAL fast.