Richard

Thanks Scott. Nothing like helping us keep on track over a month after the discussion took place.

I wouldn't say that the steepness is at all determined by the boats. Obviously there's a limit there. Freefall and drop elements are different because of they way they are designed - they aren't floating during these elements. Don't forget you've got to pump all that water to the top, which is where the limit comes in. A steep one has a much much higher flow rate thanks to gravity, and would pretty well definitely be higher for a substantially long ride. So you've got to pump the water higher, and thanks again to gravity that's no easy task and you need more of the stuff to start off with. Not impossible, but you'd need a hydro-electric pump to do the damn thing. A replica wouldn't be too easy because of constraints of landcape. Go knock on Intamin's door and they could give you a prefect layout for the plot of land. A bit more expensive, but at least it's done by a reputable manufacturer. I wouldn't want to see what a park pulls of with second hand raft parts, a whole heap of concrete and some plywood boards.

It's as hollow as they come. I could go into why filling it with concrete wouldn't do much for strength, but then that's going against my recent reluctance to talk about the physics or engineering of rides. I believe that there has been one Giant Drop, in England, which was relocated. I'm not totally sure of the specifics of it though. Needless to say, the thing is bolted together so it would be relatively easy to pull apart. Tony Braxton-Smith used the analogy of a big Mechano set recently regarding Thunderbolt, which explains it well enough. Honestly, most of the flat rides really aren't worth taking anywhere. If another Australian park chooses to pick some of them up, that'd be cool, but there's not too much in that department beyond Bounty's Revenge. I don't know, but I almost see it being not worth the bother of shipping Demon or Space Probe over to Malaysia. I'd think that they are. There might be some useful mechanical parts attached to the wood on Bush Beast or Beastie, and the trains would probably be worth $10,000 to some park who could do with the spares, but there's certainly nothing worth keeping on the wood. Then there's the discussion of the far more important stuff - deep fryers, heat chutes, cash registers and all that fun stuff. That'd be the first stuff I'd get rid of, because that's the sort of stuff you can very easily offload with an auction or two and a few Trading Post ads.

You can't really predict the success of the park based on the first day - that's just stupid. Get back to us after the Easter break has finished and then maybe you'll be able to make a valid judgement on the future of the park, but even then you've not given it a fair chance. There's a lot more to Luna Park now than the rides. I personally think that once the Big Top has established itself as a venue in Sydney the park will be able to survive on almost it alone. Throw in the other function halls and the lucrative amusement park and I see no reason for failure. The previous Luna Park failed because of noise complains and the one before that because of the fires. Never has Luna Park really faced dwindling attendance, and with this incarnation easily the most diverse of all of them, I see little reason for it to fail.

They're not really about the same things. Roller-Coaster.com.au will cover Australian parks in a more general way. Essentially, Roller-Coaster.com.au is not an opinion based site but rather a fact/information based site. Meanwhile, Total Thrills will become more of a "me" site, expanding on what it currently is - a site that I put together containing my photos, my opinions and all those subtle little jokes about how bad Australian parks are that I don't think many people get . It'll cover my travels, especially those outside of Australia or not to do with theme parks, my interests and all that sort of stuff. It'll all come together nicely. With the way Roller-Coaster.com.au was designed, it is a very low maintenance site (i.e. everything does itself/happens with one click). It'll still be frequently updated, but it takes only a fraction of the time Total Thrills did. The new Total Thrills will be similarly low maintenance, so it's really not a big workload.

I'd say you can expect the new Total Thrills in perhaps two or three months, depending on how it all goes. The new site won't be nearly as complex as Roller-Coaster.com.au is, but it will be a reasonably sized site again. What you can expect, as I'm sure I've said before is a more general site and a more graphically intensive site. I'm essentially tinkering with the design now, getting it right - nothing's been done in terms of coding or anything.

Please note that the forums are no longer located at http://www.totalthrills.com/forums. They are now found at Roller-Coaster.com.au. The URL is http://www.parkz.com.au/forums/. Please update any links, bookmarks etc. The Total Thrills version will remain up as a mirror for a few days, but you should change over nonetheless.

As seen on this article at Roller-Coaster.com.au: As Roller-Coaster.com.au continues to come together to become an all-inclusive source for Australian roller coaster and theme park enthusiasts, yet more avenues are being created. The current lineup of products includes a wide variety of different styles of shirts and tops, hats and even boxer shorts sporting the Roller-Coaster.com.au logo. For around the home there's mugs and cups, a lunchbox, apron, frisbee (a.k.a. flying disc) and a teddy bear. Be sure to check out the mousepad featuring a high-quality coaster photograph. The flagship of the store, something totally unique to Roller-Coaster.com.au - you won't find this on any other coaster sites - is the collection of posters. Coaster Profile Poster Series: Coaster Profile Posters are 16" x 20" full-colour posters showcasing roller coasters around Australian and the world, with photographs and some brief information about the rides. The current posters feature Dreamworld's Cyclone. Each poster will only be available for a limited time to make way for new ones, so be sure to get in and get them before they are replaced! Theme Parks of the World Poster Series: This is a unique series of 11" x 17" posters featuring some of the more stunning sights of theme parks around the world and can include rides, attractions or just picturesque landmarks. Focusing on beauty rather than thrills, each poster will feature a few photographs as well as a small body of text. They will be periodically replaced with new ones. Each poster will only be available for a limited time to make way for new ones, so be sure to get in and get them before they are replaced! More posters and other products will be introduced over time. Using CafePress to create the products gives us an incredibly diverse range of products at fairly reasonable prices, without sacrificing quality. Check it out now!

I wouldn't call Tomb Raider livening up Gum Tree Gully. Rather, it just butchered the area. How can you call what's there Gum Tree Gully? No single ride at Dreamworld is still marketable. They loose that after about a year. Try to find someone out there that goes specifically to Dreamworld because of Tower of Terror, Giant Drop or Wipeout. Yes, they probably go there because the collection of rides is better, but individual rides loose their novelty after about a year. You'll notice that the marketability of a new ride pretty well disappears after a year, and Dreamworld's campaigns reflect this. How many ads do you see for Cyclone these days? That's right, zero. I'm not talking about big, expensive TV spots either, I'm just talking things like the Dreamworld website, travel agents (save the particularly out-of-date ones). We're also seeing Nick Central's advertising go down, though with Nickelodeon tie-ins, it's largely a special case. Most Dreamworld advertising these days is concentrating on the "big five" or whatever they're dubbing it - the thrill rides collectively, as that is the only thing they've currently got that is appealing. Obviously when new rides come out, they'll become the new marketing attention.

Flat rides don't hurt. They're high capacity, even with Neanderthals operating the things. I would assume that Thunderbolt's spot won't be keeping the Ocean Parade theme, or that'll just become unproportionally big. Give it another theme, or better yet, no theme at all. Just make it look pretty with nice paths, gardens and trees, and a few shops here and ammenities. I just hope that they get a bit creative with the land there, even if it's a huge lot. Unfortunately, creativeness means a bigger price tag, which doesn't go down too well when you're presenting an idea to a Board of Directors to give you the money. Don't go and stick a big coaster that takes up most of the land or anything. Build the coaster of course, but minimise the amount of "Thunderbolt land" it uses.

Fair enough that Wonderland is certainly not world class (10 years ago perhaps, not today), though we're going to have to say the same about the Gold Coast parks. What've we got? Dreamworld - its signature rides include a dated launch ride and an old-fashioned and low capacity drop ride and there's not much else worth mentioning there. Wet'n'Wild has nothing that ever stock-standard water park around the world has. Movie World has a few pretty good rides, but for every good thing there, there's about five bad or tacky things about the place. Sea World's signature ride is essentially a 30-year old design that wasn't that great back then, they have pretty good animal exhibits and shows. The shows don't even compare to those overseas and the only exhibits really worth mention are Polar Bear Shores and perhaps Shark Bay (we'll have to see). Wonderland, to someone who didn't go every week or work there and know the horrible dark truth, was actually a pretty good park by Australian standards. No, it is not "world class", but then neither is anything else we have in Australia if we're going to go that way.

It's mostly fixed - the errors anyway. There's still an issue with the Thread Views counter and I'll see what I can do about that. The site has moved to a new server - the same one as Roller-Coaster.com.au is stored on, which will make some future changes a little easier to deal with. It's also running much faster, which you might have noticed.

Paramount's Kings Island opened Zodiac in 1975 and removed it in 1984. As for the link you're after - can't help you much with that.

I've just updated Roller-Coaster.com.au with an Orphan Rocker gallery. There are some nice, exclusive shots in there, including some of the ride in action, so check it out! They are working at getting the coaster up and running, though it's definitely not going to be operating this year, contrary to what some (including djrappa, joz and myself) have been told. With a full-time engineer working on the ride, it'll have a far more realistic chance of operating than it has in the past, sitting there as a side project in the back of everyone's mind.

I must appologise for the fairly constant errors you've probably found yourself getting while browsing the forums. The issue is with the database, and you'll find it's more of an inconvenience rather than anything serious. I've looked into it - if it doesn't sort itself out before too long, I should have it fixed by the weekend or so anyway. I'd just recommend in the time being, before you submit a new post or thread, you Ctrl+C what you've done so you're not loosing it all to database errors.

Does that mean when you jump on the floor it'll become all messed up and look like someone spilled ink on it? Richard, who destroyed many calculators (and just about any pen with a spring inside it) throughout his years at school.

You're right, it's not part of, nor an expansion of Australian Wildlife Experience, contrary to what has been stated elsewhere. The idea of AWE is to showcase a wide variety of Australia's wildlife in a replicated natural environment. Tell me how a petting zoo with a bunch of lambs and calves and chicks and whatnot at all fits in with this idea. The petting zoo is certainly nothing special or bold and new, but it is still quite an integral attraction for any theme park. You won't find too many that will go to Dreamworld specifically for it, but it's the sort of thing that has the capability to turn many families' day at the park from a good one to a great one. It's no secret that a larger emphasis will be put on family-oriented attractions, namely those with minimal cost yet the potential for great return. This has been been a recurring theme in a lot of Macquarie Leisure's reports. There's still a commitment to delivering top-notch thrill rides, but as has always been the case, such captial-intensive developments are unlikely to happen more than every three or four years.

Just on the glass floor, this is a very nifty product. It's commonly referred to as "smart glass" and can be done in a number of different ways. Coincidentally I was actually reading a paper on this particular stuff on Monday. It basically works by passing a voltage through a layer of some sort of crystal or particle layer that, depending on its properties and what's passing through it, changes its properties from opaque to transparent. Really nifty stuff - it'll realistically be replacing blinds and curtains by the end of the decade. I've seen it in use, and it's amazing. It goes from completely opaque like a wall (letting nothing through) to transparent just like normal glass. Interesting that what you've received said that they've got a single engineer working on it. Ten or twenty years ago it was very common for engineering projects to be worked on by a single engineer, but it's so rare these days. Because of litigation, it's rare to find someone willing to hire a lone engineer to work on a project, or a single engineer willing to work on it. Of course I have no doubt that the ride is safe and properly designed and calculated. Just looking at the thing, there's not much that even a high school physics and Maths C (I think it's Maths 4 or something in NSW... the most difficult one ) student couldn't analyse and over-engineer with a chunk of spare time. The only thing I'm worried about is stress and fatigue on the track, which would only come years down the track and can be appropriately managed with adequate inspections and maintenance. There's just a lot of weld joints there and I can see some cracks appearing all around the track. Not uncommon on many welded steel structures, but my guess is with the way this ride has been designed, it might be more prone to it than your average Swiss-designed coaster. New rule - we're not allowed to talk about the physics or engineering of rides, because I'm getting too involved and I'm actually starting to use some of the text books I paid hundreds for.

See that little button down in the right hand corner of your posts? The one that says "Edit" and has a picture of a pair of scissors next to it (looks like ). Next time you make a spelling mistake or wish to add something to a post shortly after you've posted it, click that button and you can edit your troubles away! I found this article recently and is a very good read - http://www.smh.com.au/text/articles/2004/0...9823240556.html.

There are two sets of magnets on the back of each gondola, which effectively lock around the two fins on the tower, which as I mentioned previously would be made from some alloy that can't be magnetically induced (i.e. be attracted to the magnets). This point is pretty critical to understanding how magnetic braking works, because there is no attraction between the magnets and fins and it is not a force of magnetic attraction that causes the braking. I'm not totally sure what you're getting at with your third paragraph. There's never enough force to hold it still in the brakes, and there never can be. It relies on a constantly changing area of the conductor (the fins on the tower) within the magnetic field (created by the two N-S alligned magnets on the gondola which surround this fin). If there's no changing area (i.e. it's not moving), then there is no braking force, so it wound naturally start to move. The exact moment it moves though, there is a change in area so the braking force comes back in. The result of this is essentially why when falling or being towed through the brakes, you will be traveling at a constant velocity. Increase the magnetic field (with better magnets, spacing them closer together), and this constant velocity will be slower than with a weaker magnetic field (less powerful magnets, further apart). I can't easily explain the deceleration due to gravity (I'd rather call it acceleration in the -y direction, but that's just how it'd be put on an engineering paper) without using vectors and the thing with that is if you're at a maths or physics level where you understand vectors, then this wouldn't need explaining to you. Just take it from me that something that's been shot up a 90º curve will have the same speed at the end as something that's been shot vertically up from the exact same starting point, if we're operating in a frictionless environment.

Not exactly new news, but it hasn't been discussed here before. Last I remember there were plans to keep the Caloundra park operating, and open a theme park themed to Crocodile Hunter (rather than being a wildlife park as Australia Zoo is) in Brisbane, out at the Boondall Wetlands.

The difference in height between it's lowest track before the curve and the base of the tower is not significant - there might be a metres difference in height. Certainly nothing anywhere close to 10m difference. I've negated friction and air resistance as I said earlier, because it is impossible for me to come up with a friction coefficient value without doing some pretty heavy analysis of the design of the car, right down the bearings etc. on the wheels. Friction (mechanical friction, air resistance etc.) is the only force, aside from gravity, that will create a loss of speed. In short (without getting into some basic vector geometry), without friction, the loss of speed of a body traveling up a curve is exactly the same as the same body traveling vertically to the same height. Most assumptions I made I outlined. Just in case you missed them, I'll list the untrue assumptions I made in all of the calculations I've used here. -We are operating in a frictionless environment. -The acceleration of the car is constant. -It uses induction motors, not synchronous motors to operate. -Dreamworld's publicity figures are accurate (despite being only to one or two significant figures). Because we're only working with around two significant figures (hence my speeds above of 161km/hr and 157km/hr are technically not correct, though with two significant figures they'd both be 160km/hr, which doesn't do much for these arguments), it means that these assumptions and other things I've disregarded or assumed can be perfectly justified as they don't effect anything at the level of accuracy I'm working at. By the way, while I remember, your example with the fridge magnet earlier is largely incorrect. A fridge magnet uses magnetic attraction to stick to the fridge. The braking on Giant Drop doesn't use magnetic attraction, it uses magnetic flux. You'll find that those fins on the tower are some alloy (presumably largely copper because of its conductivity) that isn't attracted to magnets to ensure that there is no magnetic attraction. The brakes on Giant Drop will always provide the same force of braking (which is never enough to counter the downward force of gravity by the way). What a change in speed does is increases the current flowing through the fins. This is why the humming sound it makes as it slows starts off with a high pitch and becomes lower until it stops - at the top of the brake run it is traveling fastest, so more electricity hence a louder sound. As it slows, the current decreases, as does the motor sound. Just think of it as the reverse of a linear induction motor if that makes it any easier. Where they pump in electricity which is used to make a magnetic field to give motion, Giant Drop (or any magnetic braking system) takes motion, passes it through a permanent magnetic field (i.e. made from natural magnets) which converts this motion into electricity.

A speed of 130km/hr would take the car roughly 65m up the tower. 140km/hr roughly 75m. That's ignoring air resistance and friction. I don't know about you, but I don't think I see it a whole 45-55m from the top. Meanwhile a speed of 161km/hr takes it 100m up - around 20m from the top and 157km/hr gives us 95m - 25m from the top. That's more realistic. The ride's certainly rarely, if ever running below around 150km/hr.

I'd say that on any ride of Tower of Terror, you've only got around a 40% chance of actually getting a speed reading. It's not the most accurate thing anyway - it's got at least a ±10km/hr margin of error on it based on what I've seen it spit out. Now, onto the real stuff. Let's do a bit of physics to work out how much of a saving we're talking if the speed is reduced to the 157km/hr it currently runs at. 161km/hr in 7s leads to an average acceleration of 23km/hr/s or 6.4m/s². Meanwhile running at 157km/hr, the average acceleration is 22.4km/hr/s or 6.2m/s². Assuming the weight of car is 6 tonnes as most publicity material about the ride suggests, this means a force to accelerate the car of 38400N for 161km/hr, and 37400N at 157km/hr. I'll skip ahead a few steps, because it'll just confuse most people. I'm using some magnetic flux equations to determine the amperes required for the launch but because of the unknowns involved I can't get an exact result but rather a relative percentage. It's also worthwhile pointing out that the formulas I am using technically only apply to induction, but are reasonably translatable to the synchronous situation we're dealing with on TOT. In short, a launch at 157km/hr will need around 2.6% less amps than a 161km/hr. Power, watts, are found by Voltage x Amps. Voltage will ALWAYS been a constant in situations like this, so hence it will also cost 2.6% less to operate at 157km/hr. We know also from promotional material that it requires 2.2MW of power for the launch, which means that the 157km/hr launch saves us 57,200W per launch. That's running your toaster for about 23 hours. Not that significant really. It's still costing us 2.14MW to launch the thing. Your annectotal evidence doesn't really go with the numbers I'm seriously doubting that Dreamworld's at all on the same grid as Coomera, or that Tower of Terror has ever been the direct cause of blackouts in Coomera. It is said that TOT launching temporarily doubles Dreamworld's power usage, which means that they're drawing about 4,500,000W of power every 10 seconds - how the hell is 57,200W off this at all going to make even the slightest difference - we're talking around 1% of their total energy!

kennykoala - no one's taking jabs at you. By all means, if you don't want us to discuss things you bring up in a level-headed way, then don't come here posting things! You come here and repeat things that you've obviously heard around Dreamworld. We then discuss what you've said, adding our opinions and whatnot. You then come back and think somehow that because we're not saying "WOW! THAT'S COOL!!!!!!" we don't appreciate what you've said. Seriously, just calm down and don't get so defensive about everything.