Zonga or Taz Texas Tornado

What name best describe the ride? or the better name

No offense, but before you start starting a bunch of new threads and then get upset because no one pays attention to them, you might want to post in currently on-going discussions in place. I see you've lurked a few days, which is good, but start slow instead of jumping in with topics so that you can get the feel of the community here :).

sorry, its my first time doing forms

Right, I understand. In fact, I was trying to give ya a tip before someone else came in with attitude.

Buzz is not like most other forums out there. It is a rather diverse community, and many people would rather make fun of you or be totally rude instead of help you 'learn the ropes'. Best piece of advice I can give you is for the next few weeks or a month or so, go without actually starting new topics, instead just read the topics that interest you and reply with your input.

But don't get upset if someone doesn't agree with you, and ignore people just trying to be rude. Make sure you read and re-read the Terms of Service (found under the 'About Coasterbuzz' link to your right) really good so you know what is and isn't acceptable.

Other than that, Welcome!

TeknoScorpion said:[quoteRight, I was trying to give ya a tip before someone else came in with attitude
Who had the attitude? i was just saying sorry it was my first time. To get back on topic Zonga or texas tornado? what would you pick?

Nobody has/had any attitude in this thread yet. Tekno was just trying to be polite and warn you that it's possible with newbies who start a bunch of threads.

As for your question, I've never ridden it so I can't give an answer that best describes the ride experience, BUT I prefer Thriller myself. Can't top the original.

Yeah is Good!

i understand now. i forgot about the name Thriller. I rode it when it was in houston texas as Taz Texas Tornado and it was a cool ride.

Yes, i wasn't saying you had an attitude, I was trying to give you a heads up that someone else might get an attitude :).

Now about that Tekno... he only has one attitude.

Bad. ;)

The Flying Turns makes all the right people wet - Gonch

FYI, there are quite a lot of threads about it already, such as this one...
http://www.coasterbuzz.com/forum.aspx?mode=thread&TopicID=35043

The ride has quite an interesting history.

My personal take on it is that it was a child of a very competitive era of portable coasters surpassing each other in size and inversions, which are mostly credited to late Anton Schwarzkopf and his team.
The latest work of Anton in this series was the "Olympia Looping" which still tours the Fairgrounds today and actually is a really great ride.
I remember though that "Thriller" was at first a point of discussion not so much for safety reasons, but it was a very loud coaster and people who lived close to the Freiburg fairground where it was installed for the first time achieved that it had to finish daily operations sooner so they could actually go to sleep in the evening.
I rode it on the 3rd day after it opened late for the very first time on the fairground in Freiburg, Germany as a portable coaster, and it hurt my neck (nothing permanent though).
It was certainly very daunting to ride, and the first drop had to be the most death-defying first drop of any coaster I had ever seen, it all looked just out-of-this-world riding up the lift hill, and then such an apocalyptic feeling rolling along that lonely thin rail at the very top of the coaster, looking down on this layout and the first inversion - such a long way down and nothing in the world to stop the train... I will never forget that.
Before you know it, it drags the floor from under your feet and sents you into this incredible twisting free-fall which feels very wrong and gives you the feeling you're absolutely going to fall out of the train (there were only lapbars as restraints, which added to the feeling) - into that first set of back-to-back loops - wow, what an incredible rush!
The place my injury happened was not the back to back loops, but the two small so-called "loop screws" in front, namely the smaller one, which tore my head forward with a force I hadn't expected - I know it has been claimed that all these problems have been fixed afterwards, but I still think the entire layout is pushing the envelope of what human riders should be subjected to a little too far.
Now it stands punished and neutered in northern California with a shortened first drop and some other smaller changes, and people have described the ride experience as "spoofy" - what a (maybe still somewhat deserverd?) shame.
The first drop and the terror the whole thing radiated used to be really great. I guess it's a somewhat unique landmark in the coaster world - and it's history certainly is some kind of drama, as all of its appearances had problems of their own. Maybe its complete history should be made into a film sometime.
*** Edited 8/13/2005 9:20:36 AM UTC by superman***

Bad Bad Bad Bad Boy. I Make you feel so good.

And you know this.

;)

Tekno: U a Gloria Estefan fan as well?
Who would have guessed...
;)

Uh oh...Tekno is a fan of Scissor Sisters, Gloria Estefan, and Janet Jackson? Next thing we know you're moving to West Hollywood ;)

Or Miami ;).

Enough already.

The ride is - and always will be - Thriller.

I sure hope this thing, by any name, (and if Thriller was good enough for Anton, LOL)....is down *temporarily* and will be running again - hopefully by July '06 at least...;)

I hope they remove it and build something else. If they won't open it because people are complaining of neck injuries, then they should put something else in it's place. Maybe they could remove "Flashback" from SFMM and install it in "Zonga's" place. Do they ever run "Flashback" anymore? If not, why not? Is it also one of Anton's designs?

No, Flashback has been down for a while, and is an IntaRide.

^beeep! Its a Stengel (and one of his employees) and Giovanola (with B&M somewhere in the mix) design.

marvin6988 said:
Do they ever run "Flashback" anymore? If not, why not? Is it also one of Anton's designs?

My son ( :) ;) ), Anton Schwarzkopf is one of the pioneers of coaster design, and his inventions were wicked but were also works of a genius- In the end, many inventions that make modern steel coasters as popular as they are today can be credited to him, the most famous one being to make vertical loops rideable.
His travelling coasters display greatness in many aspects at the same time (from the engineering point of view, the rider's point of view, and the design point of view - looking at the coaster from the outside).
Basically, shutting down the coasters to which Anton contributed would amount to quite a few:
Link to Schwarzkopf contributions on RCDB
(And no, Flashback is not one of them)
(It can be noted though that Werner Stengel who used to be in Anton's team supposedly worked on both Thriller and Flashback, and also Son of Beast. But to his credit, he has probably worked on nearly all coasters on everyones top-10-list as well, of course)

Thriller/Zonga/ETC is a one-of. It just has it's own reasons and history, and certainly remains just a landmark to the human desire to create the most scary and thrilling ride possible - within the technical limitations of a travelling coaster - and the physical limitations of the human body.
Supposedly, it ran without any problems for years and years on the German fairs after I rode it - maybe there is a way to ride it properly. It's just that fascinatingly dangerous machine - a steel equivalent to the Chrystal Beach Cyclone, possibly (though I guess, that one was indeed more harmful, and Anton Schwarzkopf and Harry Traver supposedly were very different characters.)

*** Edited 8/14/2005 10:03:07 AM UTC by superman***