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Baconjack

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Everything posted by Baconjack

  1. I see the "Dippin dots guy said this" meme that goes around the roller coaster enthusiast community has now eventually spread onto here. It was only a matter of time. Why would you suddenly be aware of an NDA (let alone be covered by it) if you weren't an employee of village in the 1st place? Are your mates breaking theirs giving you this "information"?
  2. When the vehicles were upgraded in 2015 they installed fitted out Vekoma train bodies while leaving the original Arrow chassis intact. Cyclone/BD vehicle bodies were very likely thrown in the skip bin after that, without any real use for them, or were thrown in the boneyard and eventually cleared out a few years after for the lazy river. Wasn't there another original Big Dipper carriage that fell into the possession of somebody else and still exists? The park itself maybe? Even then for a 'theme' there will probably be some photos and captions of the previous coasters to look at but even that's wishful thinking. Kind of like what was/is in the Big Dipper tower when you walked up it to get to Tumble Bug? But in all honesty the 'theming' is already there - the tower itself.
  3. Provided that literally nothing has been changed externally to Boomerang's ride vehicles other than some decals I'm going to say it'll be the same deal for Big Dipper. Maybe a decal or two on the lead car, but nothing much else. Hopefully Intamin have a generic version of the ride vehicle with an alternative wheel bogie cover because I would say with the one seen in the animations looks quite dumb and out of place for LPS.
  4. It more less has something to do with it being constantly shut for maintenance in the last few years. No different to Tower. By all accounts it seems Buzzsaw wasn't an easy ride to maintain. I'll take Steel Taipan over Buzzsaw and TOT any day of the week. I'm sure most people in here will as well. Continuing to limp on shithouse aging attractions was the DW strategy in the past, but you just can't get away with that these days.
  5. Lockdown and not going to parks has gotten me rather bored so I've been building an Epcot-style park as a PLC project. I might share some more photos as I keep working on this if interested!
  6. I think it's a bit unfair to call out Mark Shaw and AW management for Abyss. It was a good investment for the biggest gap in the park's lineup. The main flaw with it is that lap bars should have been installed on the trains at the start rather than the shoulder restraints, which were already not doing favours to some of the older eurofighters back then. DW on the other hand paid almost half of Abyss's budget for Buzzsaw (figure was $7m iirc) from a much larger park. Buzzsaw is a more egregious example of being cheap imo. There was a time when Adventure World was seen as the benchmark for theme park operation in this country and that's when Mark was around.
  7. What a flop of a ride. Through and through disaster. A shit ride bought from a 3rd tier manufacturer (maybe 2nd tier if you want to be generous) that was purchased because it was the cheapest option for a ride. Ran into the ground for its entire life and eventually aged into a shithouse bone shaker. Frequently in and out of closure for about half of its time at DW and outlived by a coaster three times its age. Not to mention, it ran for only 9 years before Ardent gave up, an embarrassment considering literal prototype coasters have operated for twice as long before closing. This is why you invest in high quality attractions and maintain them properly, rather than going for quite literally the cheapest possible option. Let Buzzsaw serve as a warning to our parks wanting to cheap out on attractions and maintenance as it is the prime example of what happens when operators don't care about their parks.
  8. I've heard this idea on here before, from memory there were whispers that Village was toying with the idea of having Intamin to come in and re-work the ride system a few years back, but I wouldn't be 100% certain on that.
  9. Visited site this afternoon. Some finishing touches on maloneys corner with boomerang station painted yellow and a tent surrounding Boomerang's helix, walls are down for what was meant to be Friday. BD hill section before 1st launch is up as well. Looks like they might be leaving the second section till later
  10. Village sold heaps of Bermuda Triangle animatronics years ago and props from various old attractions many years ago didn't they? DW could have made some money from selling ride props from TOT, wipeout and rocky hollow, maybe even what was in the boneyard. Worst case scenario if you don't sell, bin it, best case scenario you make money off some person who wants to pay bonkers amounts for ride theming. Might end up not selling but should have given it a go.
  11. Seems like they will try to get as much of the work for BD done as possible on the midway section this week before opening day, then work will be done around the maloney's corner side on the weekdays the park isn't open. Expecting progress to be slow or heaps of testing if they are trying to get it done for a December opening though
  12. Look take some graphics made for the LPS website with a grain of salt but this seems to make the possibility that the dodgem building is being gutted and used as the queue for BD very real
  13. "Average hyper coaster by world standards", lol what? this just proves that you have pretty much no idea what you are talking about. DCR is very highly regarded by many in our hobby, not just in here, but internationally. People rave about the backwards experience as well. I'd be keen to hear what in your opinion is a better hyper than DCR. I don't disagree the theming is minimal at best but in all honesty for the role it plays in MW's lineup, it isn't even necessary. DCR is basically "big scary roller coaster" and that's what it was built to be. Also to mention, "world class ride" is a pretty subjective criteria. For some, a "world class ride" is a Disney-style simulator, or a modern immersive flume, or a Universal Spider-Man style dark ride . For roller coasters? By all accounts DCR is a great example of this
  14. Based on the 2020 annual report and conference call info already posted on here, seems that Buzzsaw's time is limited. Needless to say I don't find myself surprised, it has been constantly in and out of operation over the years, heaps of issues with the restraints, isn't a very popular ride (based on my visits), has cosmetically and mechanically aged like milk, and has been basically run into the ground for most of its life. Also, the fact that heaps of the major rides at DW have been given updates over the past few years, while Buzzsaw has sat by itself in a secluded corner of the park and gotten pretty much nothing says a lot also. I wouldn't be surprised to see DW try and stretch out the ride's time at the park until ST is ready to open then actively look at options for a replacement. Provided, there's still plenty of other things DW need to get done until a Buzzsaw replacement, so it might be a while.
  15. Probably not even worth spending the money repainting buzzsaw considering it probably won't be sticking around long term. Give it maybe 2-3 years max before DW seriously need to consider removing it.
  16. Lol i was the one who sent this tip off to the original video creator in the first place. That being said I'd take any rumours of expansion here with a grain of salt for now. There isn't any real proof or substance to it whatsoever beyond a google translated Thai article. I'll be keeping a keen eye on their 2020-21 annual report, or anything on their more established progress overseas to come out before I assume anything is happening. I agree but this will probably be more of a Timezone on steroids kind of thing and less of a theme park. Considering how timezone have done pretty much a complete 180 in popularity in the last few years (eg: the one at Surfers getting a complete redo a couple of years back), it doesn't surprise me that Sega would be eyeing off trying their hand in here again. Sonic as a brand was pretty much non-relevant here until the movie came out last year, nek minnit toys of the character sell out within 2 days at target. Neither was Sega World back in the day, funnily enough. It was literally a copy-paste of what was at Joypolis in 1997 with some Sonic to appeal to the local audience. I expect something similar if this does end up eventuating.
  17. Congrats mate should have to visit you in the park soon when it reopens!
  18. Probably closing the ride for a bit or making an alternative queue point. Unless in the next 3 weeks all of the supports and track for that section of Big Dipper is put in, that will have to be the case until the section is complete.
  19. Footers going in at the Maloneys corner end of big dipper and some extra supports added over the last few days
  20. I'm sure a lego area would be a home run for DW. Replace two largely outdated IP's and a maybe semi-current one with an IP that is basically timeless. Plus you have the closest thing to Legoland in Australia. That being said, there is a major challenge at play with trying to work out a deal with Merlin to license the property out, which is either going to be costly or won't happen at all. Although, Dreamworks might stay in the end. With time we'll figure out what it is, what we've seen so far is speculative
  21. Best of luck to anyone who applied for a job at LPS - as long as you show heaps of energy in the interview and availability, you'll go well. I did end up getting a job as a ride attendant at LPS last year, however lockdown came into effect a day after getting the offer so unfortunately I was never able to work a day there in the end. I'm happy where I am right now though so I decided to pass on doing it again, I would rather visit LPS or any park for fun as a hobby with my annual pass rather than go there to work.
  22. Oooh exciting! I'm assuming these footings will be for Big Dipper?
  23. Probably this, the old maloney's corner rides had pretty short queues built to begin with (maybe like a couple of switchbacks at most) and I've never waited above maybe 15 minutes for anything at LPS that isn't the wild mouse There is room in the Big Dipper facade to house some of the queue (the stairs you walk up to go to tumble bug), but definitely something of note.
  24. Pretty unnecessary to make smart-ass backhanded comments like this. Uncalled for.
  25. I think the longest I've waited for a ride is when I waited 2 hours for TOT about 10 years ago, and roughly 90 minutes for Space Mountain at Hong Kong Disneyland, bear in mind I went to the park unaware that it was 'golden week' around the Chinese national holiday where all the mainlanders go over which was a mistake. Compared to a few years ago I feel as if our parks have improved quite a bit with dealing with bigger crowds, and capex investment is being put into rides that are designed with capacity in mind (rivals, leviathan and probably steel taipan) compared to building shit like buzzsaw, tot, cyclone, green lantern etc. Back in the day, 2 hour waits for superman, tot, et al seemed to be the norm when visiting MW and DW in peak. Nowadays, you'd be hard pressed to find anything above 90 minutes. Obviously I'd like further to be done (designing coasters with more than 3 block zones for 3 train ops would be a good 1st step) but it's a definite improvement over how it used to be.
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