The Great Escape's Getting Astroworld's SLC!

FP....I probably enjoyed SWAT as much as any flat ride in Texas....OK, save the Rock-O-Plane at Sandy Lake.

But I found SWAT to be an absolute BLAST...and even though I would have *preferred* it to spin a little faster, it still ranks as one of the most insane flats I've ridden...

Never rode one of the spinning inflatable raft rides until recently at Cypress....WOW did that thing spin! Those "grabber/kicker thingies", those made the ride almost intolerably spinny...I'm sure the kids and families LOVE those things.

I can't imagine many flats beating a Rock-O-Plane... flying scooters, a flying coaster and a Yo-Yo being the possible exceptions.

New Flatbeds Have Arrived...

A little update here, as more & more flatbeds are showing up with track pieces from Astroworld's Serial Thriller.

Here's the direct link to a couple pix...
Photo1
Photo2
Photo3

I'm liking what I'm seeing, although hopefully it will get a new color scheme before it assembles.

Question to those who know about construction scheduals. An SLC is a cookie-cutter ride that'll fit on almost any flat piece of land... from the day of pouring footers to the day it test-rdes, how long would you say it takes to assemble an SLC? Couple months? Longer, less? How long do footers take to cure once poured?

Just a guess, but steel should probably take about a month to errect.

...or less if you have stool, er, steel softener....

Is laxative humour still funny? :)

;)

Rob Ascough said:
And this does nothing to shed light on what is happening with PGA's shuttle that sits in SFMW's parking lot...

It's now spare parts for Kentucky Kingdom's shuttle. Tidal Wave/GL is officially retired to the scrap heap as a complete ride, and that’s the reason it’s sitting in SFMW’s parking lot rusting away. It's been picked over pretty heavily over the last couple of years, (and the pile of ride keeps getting smaller and smaller.)

Kinda sad, but at least it's still alive in a certain sorta way. *** Edited 12/20/2005 7:11:00 AM UTC by New Bay***

"Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep." Scott Adams

Laxative humor is ALWAYS funny ;)

Too bad about TW/GL- I was hopeful that it would be sent to another Six Flags park. Odd how the two Great America Tidal Waves would eventually meet again, in a matter of speaking!

UPDATED NEW INFO:

-- It looks as though Great Escape is going to be getting Astroworld's Tidle Wave. Tidle Wave is the double-dip Shoot-the-Chutes ride. A couple pieces arrived last week & more have arrived very recently this week.

As noted here...
(again, I think you gotta register, so I'll just post the pic link directly) you can see pics of the ride arriving in good form (but in need of a lot of TLC)

-- Picture #1 of Tidle Wave
-- Picture #2 of Tidle Wave
-- Picture #3 of Tidle Wave

Looks like Great Escape got a pretty decent deal on Astroworlds assessments. Not the big-thrills like New England, but still it almost completes the park by have a variety of everything for everyone now!

Again, it looks to be slated more for a 2007 opening more-so than 2006.

Actually, New Bay, all the parts for GL including the entire trains are still at SFMW. The ride hasn't been used for parts yet, though it has been heavily rumored for at least a year now.

rollergator said:
Never rode one of the spinning inflatable raft rides until recently at Cypress....WOW did that thing spin! Those "grabber/kicker thingies", those made the ride almost intolerably spinny...I'm sure the kids and families LOVE those things.

Those grabber/kicker thingies are an ancient technology known as velcro:) No, I'm serious. Underneath each boat are about six round pads of velcro which interact with the opposing velcro squares out on the course. So basically what happens is that, say coming off the lift, your boat hits the first patch which causes the boat to get temporarily hung up on the left side. The rest of your boat which is free still has momentum though which starts the spin. I've literally had to close my eyes after the last drop due to the out-of-control spinning.

Now as far as the SLC goes, they maybe cookie cutter, but it's insane the amount of supports used to hold everything up. That's a lot of steel pipes to ship and install, not to mention all the footers.

Sadly ultra twister seems to be the only other SFAW coaster that's staying in the chain & guess who's getting it?

The SLC is a smart move for TGE though as it will round out their collection of coasters quite nicely & it'll certainly look better with a new coat of paint on it when it goes up.

Who's getting Ultra Twister?

At least the auctioning of the coasters to other parks opens up a good possibility of a smaller park snatching up what they could not otherwise afford as a new coaster.

Buying a used coaster is one thing... but installing it is another problem! Someone I know who works at a park told me that half the price of a brand new coaster was installation and transport. So yeah... get it cheap, but it will cost more than the price of the used ride to build it at your park.