Maintenance.

[djsupersleuth]

l worked with the maintenance crew at wonderland. All the guys that worked there from the beginning till the close of the park should be made gods for the excellent record of safety achieved in the history of themeparks.

Well Bulletproof, since you put it that way its hard not to agree.

[zordmaker]

Zordy... as far as your little Rubber Band Analogy... we're not talking about a rubber band here... we're talking about very expensive components. generally, most of the mechanics inside these rides showed signs of wear and tear and abuse, before they became "unusable". if detected early enough, they were replaced before they failed. Finding cracks in major support structures cannot always be detected on daily inspections, and it takes a trip to the workshop for them to be able to pull the whole thing apart and find these problems. Yes Its interesting that these major flaws were found, and it was resolved not to be fixed at the time, and i think that can be put down to the whole "we're closing down soon" thing... but amazing how it was so inefficient to repair it for Wonderland, but some of those same rides then received new parts just in time to be shipped to a new location in another park...?

What I was illustrating is that regardless of the machine, the decision to run it or not to run it is a digital one, i.e. it is either a "yes" or a "no". Just because a "yes" suddenly seems to become a "no" one day, doesnt mean something catastrophic happened the day before to change everybody's mind. It just means that (as others here have said) certain parts are deemed to have reached the end of their safe service life and now need to be replaced or fixed. As far as Wonderland is concerned its no secret that a vast majority of rides were reaching the end of their economic service lives (some after 18 years in service) and that the decision for management was either to inject a s**t load of cash into the park to deal with this or just to close it and cash in on the land value. They chose the latter. The time comes when maintenance stops being maintenance and crosses over into that world we call "preservation". That usually happens when the work needed to fix an item exceeds it's replacement cost - which might not be the actual cost needed to replace it but is more likely to be the percieved worth of the item on the open market if it were still working or in the case of a theme park, whether the item is a major draw card of the park or not. There are dozens of parks around the world that keep rides working that are beyond their "service life" and spend more on their "preservation" than they otherwise would if they didnt feel that the ride was an integral reason why visitors come and visit their park. These decisions are always being reviewed by managements of these parks and nobody ever knows when the "last ride" day will come. Usually it comes when certain major items need reworking again after the first restoration. Not sure if WL staff considered this but a common fix for getting around the problem of worn pinions, bearings or racks is simply to reverse the rack or pinion or bearing on it's shaft or track. Usually in service these parts wear on one side only but the case hardening is always appied to both sides of the teeth or track, meaning that you can swap or reverse the rack so that the force is taken off the (worn) side and placed on the (still good) side, thus doubling the effective life of these parts. There is a good chance that some of the rides at WL had already had this done to them back in the '90s meaning that this time around when they "wore out", it meant that there was no option but to complely replace the part with a newly engineered item.. and that's when it's time to start some deep thinking and ask "do we still need this ride"... ZordMaker

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

What I was illustrating is that regardless of the machine, the decision to run it or not to run it is a digital one, i.e. it is either a "yes" or a "no".

I think you mean BINARY as opposed to DIGITAL.

As far as Wonderland is concerned its no secret that a vast majority of rides were reaching the end of their economic service lives (some after 18 years in service)

Remember that a lot of the flats originally installed at wonderland were USED rides when they were installed to begin with. Wizard's Fury itself was 30 years old when it was erected at Wonderland. So a 10 year halflife of a bearing or other consumable item would mean some of those rides chewed through more than a single bearing in their life at wonderland.

[Gazza]

I think you mean BINARY as opposed to DIGITAL.

I thought is was BOOLEAN.

[jcgoldcoast]

No, boolian is a type of command, I cant remember what thought, binary is the right term, it simply means 0's and 1's IE yes, or no.

[Daniel]

Hands up if it's irrelevant!

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

actually he is kind of right.... i think... Boolean is true and false I THINK (in other words yes and no) if i am not mistaken.. Binary is ON and OFF (which i suppose you could say was yes and no), but i dont see how yes and no is digital... so whoever is right... zordy is... once again... wrong... and thats really all that matters in this argument...

[rappa]

No Zordy is right... a digital singnal can only be comprised of binary (on and off OR true and false OR yes and no) data there is no in between like with analogue. Man this is a thread about maintenance on a roller coaster forum and we are arguing over what method of electrical signal best describes the relationship of a rubber band breaking which is being used as an analogy for a bearing failing... do we see a problem here?? I hate to use the word but the one I'm thinking of has an N an E a R and a D in it

[Daniel]

I still stand by my statement! Who gives two craps? What was the topic again? Oh yeah, Wally World's cost cutting. Get back to it you dolts!

[Bussy]

No Zordy is right... a digital singnal can only be comprised of binary (on and off OR true and false OR yes and no) data there is no in between like with analogue.

Boolean is the same thing too. Anyway back to the subject, the fact of the matter is that due to cost cutting with the parks budget the first thing to go is 'non essential' maintenance, which unfortunately means that it will cost more to fix in the long term. It a strange thing and I have seen it at every workplace, managers don't like spending money and therefore don't if they can avoid it but when the **** hits the fan and something needs urgent attention it costs them way more than it would have if they had spent a little on smaller fixes. "The Bus is now leaving for Fixters Creek, Tasmania"

[Daniel]

Maintenance were unfortunately put in a position where they were unable to do any proactive work, hence the ****house state of the majority of Wonderland's rides in the last few years.

[Adam]

but i dont see how yes and no is digital

How you reached this conclusion I have no idea. The fundamental principal behind digital electronics is the sending of pulses down a wire (i.e. 'yes' and 'no' commands)... I quote answers.com - "A digital system is one that uses discrete values rather than a continuous spectrum of values". And as is quite obvious now, the discrete values are yes/no, on/off, 1/0 etc.

[Flasher]

Well Bulletproof, since you put it that way its hard not to agree.

Sleuth, did you work in Maintenance, or did you just know people who did?

[djsupersleuth]

Sleuth, did you work in Maintenance, or did you just know people who did?

I did work in maintenance.

[Zamperla]

Great photos, any idea of progress on the ex-Wonderland model? Will it remain in and travel Australia?

I don't know anything about the status of this one. I know the original engineering firm who manufactured them under license are in Melbourne, so they may well be contracted to refurbish it and trailerise it.

Even now as an adult I still don't really understand how all the mechanics of that central hub works and would love to see it pictured and explained in detail. The counter rotating gears, hydralic lifts and all the rings contained under that top cap certainly make for some interesting mechanics to watch.

Yes it sure is, a very complicated brilliantly designed ride. I particularly used to like watching the speed of the main gear that rotates the ride, spin at twice the rate against the eccentric one. The rides are also capable of running backwards as well as forwards, though most of the park models were rarely run backwards. (I know the travelling one did) Did the unit at Wonderland have an automated release of the lapbars?

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

taz did have electronic release of the lapbars... and wonderland used to run tazzie backwards, back in the day it also had an exit and entrance on opposite sides of the ride. I'm pretty confident I can assume this was axed to improve capacity and cut down ride time. As posted elsewhere on this site, Management eventually put all the rides on Automatic operation, where possible, so they did not need to train their operators as intensely, saving money, and possible screw ups...

[djsupersleuth]

Did the unit at Wonderland have an automated release of the lapbars?

Yes it had a switch on the operators panel to lock/unlock the lapbars.

[Zamperla]

OK. The LP Melb one despite having a 'release' button on the console, never did have that feature installed for automatic release of the bars.

[SP7Queen]

whilst this is an old topic, my question relates. does anyone know if a couple of maintenance/rides op managers ended up getting married?

[Daniel]

Yes.

[djsupersleuth]

whilst this is an old topic, my question relates. does anyone know if a couple of maintenance/rides op managers ended up getting married?

Well supervisors yes, managers no

[Daniel]

Well supervisors yes, managers no

I assumed she did mean them. If not, I apologise for giving you a bum steer SP7.

[SP7Queen]

indeed, i meant supervisors. sorry it's 7 years since i was there and forgot the lingo the joy and frustration of net chat is knowing/not knowing if i'm talking to someone i knew back then probably not being so long ago thanks for your correction

[Daniel]

Either way, who you were asking about got married in Bali I think it was.

[Wazza1]

whilst this is an old topic, my question relates. does anyone know if a couple of maintenance/rides op managers ended up getting married?

Knowing how long ago it was that you were employed there Queen I think the people that you are referring to and the people that everyone else is talking about (Bali wedding)are not the same people. But yes the people whom you are referring to also did indeed get hitched. I am sure you still have bad dreams about her frizzy blonde hair