TRON starts pull-through testing in Magic Kingdom

Nice to be able to talk about an actual roller coaster for a change...I've been to Shanghai, but didn't get a chance to ride it there. Visited on my first day and was too jet-lagged to hold out for my fastpass time. (I did manage Pirates, though, and it is every bit as good as advertised.)

https://www.wdwmagic.com/attractions/tron/news/01sep2021-pull-throu...ingdom.htm

The bloggers have been losing their minds on whether or not they were actually working on the ride, but certainly this is a good sign. The 50th anniversary thing is going to last, what, 18 months? Might as well spread out the openings!

I was kinda into Disney bloggers for a few months there, but after their reaction to Genie+, it's hard to stomach any of their criticism.

They’re not wrong about genie+.

this week at Disneyland, with no Fastpass of any sort, the lines have been once in a lifetime short. 10 min max for Space ans 15 minutes for Radiator Springs Racers. And this includes all of the new Passholes, I mean Keyholes coming to the park.

genie+ will screw all of that up

That has nothing to do with MaxPass/FastPass/Genie+, though. The number of people walking through the gate has been incredibly low probably from the start of school and the delta variant. I know a ton of bloggers looked at the early August numbers and proclaimed "See how much AP's matter! As soon as Magic Keys are released, the parks will be flooded and Disney will remember who truly butters their bread!" But then August 25th came and went with a thud.

It doesn't matter how they distribute those people in various lines, it was never going to be crowded and lines were never going to be long.

TRON at the Magic Kingdom is the ride I am the most happy about that is coming to the american Disney parks. TRON in Shanghai is a blast, with just the right amount of length and intensity for a Disney ride, with an incredible light and effect show inside the ride.

The approach of the ride in Shanghai is great, as like Space Mountain at the Magic Kingdom, Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris, it is the thing you see at the back of the land, drawing your curiosity and making you come closer to see what is happening.

My main concern at the Magic Kingdom is capacity: the ride has 7 trains, with 6 of those on the ride at a time. 14 passengers per train dispatched every 30-35 seconds is great at most parks... except Disney and Universal. 1200-1300 pph is borderline acceptable for a signature ride at those parks and TRON will be a challenge operationally. The trains in Shanghai either have seven pairs of lightcycles or six pairs of cycles and one light car with standard seating at the end called the TAV there. The TAV has a lap bar similar to Everest and allows those who can't bend down on the regular cycle or can't fit to still ride. The ride control system is smart enough to advice cast members one such train is coming, so they can assign seating accordingly.

Will the ride have mandatory ride lockers or cast members taking the loose items and bags in Florida? The ride opened in Shanghai with mandatory free lockers for anything larger than a wallet or cell phone, as the cycle only storage compartment is the right size for those and nothing else. After a few years, the lockers became a paid option, as you could not take your things through the line. When you were assigned a row at the grouper cast member, another cast member was there with a push cart and he or she collected everything that would not fit in the storage comparment. After your ride, he'd wait at the unload platform with the cart and riders would collect their items.

Why can't the new ride be updated to better accommodate based on their previous learnings?

Shanghai Disneyland has two light cars that they place on the trains, replacing the back pair of cycles. As for accomodating riders, its the nature of the riding position, as TRON had the back bar locking riders down and a silver bar comes out from the side, securing calves. They even managed to theme a locked restraint signal, as the lightcycle wheel color change to a dark blue once the restraints are ok.

I wonder how many TAV's WDW will have.

I was referring to the loose objects. Regardless, I don't think it's reasonable to assume everything will be exactly the same at MK.

Jeff said:

I was referring to the loose objects. Regardless, I don't think it's reasonable to assume everything will be exactly the same at MK.

The space for the cellphone/wallet is on top, with a flat rubber cover. There is no space for anything bigger and a bag left on the floor would not make it out of the station.

This is the TAV in comparison:

That doesn't answer my question. Why do you assume the MK vehicles will be exactly the same?

The ride is a clone of the Shanghai Disneyland installation, with a different entrance and exit to accommodate the WDW railroad. It was obvious to see when they were installing the outside curve and giant canopy and the building is the same size as in Shanghai.

I had the chance to go visit TRON backstage in Shanghai as part of an IAAPA educational tour and it was impressive. The train garage and control tower are lightyears beyond what Disney was doing as recently as the 1990s and after in that aspect.

Guardians of the Galaxy at Epcot wil be brand new tech when it comes to Disney and Vekoma. The spinning cars have onboard motors that will allow them to orient the cars where they need them, like an omnimover.

So they're obviously building the same track, and therefore they can't change something about the trains? I don't get that thinking.

The seats that attach to the trains are at least identical. They had one sitting outside of Space Mountain for awhile last year.

I'm just naturally skeptical of anyone suggesting that things can't change. I mean Tesla cars aren't even the same month to month.

What 99er said. The demo seats that were installed near the worksite were a copy of the Shanghai Disneyland TRON test seats. In addition, if Disney didn't modify the restraints of Seven Dwarves Mine Train when they cloned it for Magic Kingdom, knowing full well the lap bars were a bit narrow for americans, they won't change TRON seats. They may add a TAV or two, but that will be the only concession.

The MK version was before the Shanghai version. (confession: I just looked that up on Wiki because I didn’t even know there was a clone.)

Great, but the pervasive thinking in enthusiast circles that engineered things can't evolve or change bothers me. B&M and Intamin trains have been evolving for years.

Although the B&M speed trains seem to be devolving (away from that awkward parallelogram arrangement).

I bet if you dig into a train on Orion, in the details, it's a lot different than Raging Bull. Look at how different the trains are between Banshee and Raptor, for example.