silver2005

There is one thing I thought of that would support the layout as most people speculate where the lift is behind Sling Shot. Those triangle footers might very well be for the lift hill. It might be that the 2nd element (I'm guessing a vertical loop) comes either really close or even threads the lift which would explain the use of the triangle footers to handle supports for more than the lift. Also, B&M usually sets up the track where the transfer is between the station and the train shed, which would make the station be right by the paths.

On those speaking of using 20 year old technology for an inverted- they still build wooden coasters, whose technology spans 100+ years. Just sayin'.

^Talon, Patriot, Great Bear, Nemesis Inferno, and Nemesis all have only 4. Flight Deck at CGA only has 3. Also, when I mentioned full circuit earlier, I was referring that KI could go for the tallest inverted coaster record for full circuit coasters without going for the overall record. Just because Wicked Twister is a shuttle coaster doesn't exclude it from being an inverted coaster.

Alpengiest is the tallest in the full circuit category at 195 ft with a 170 ft first drop. Of all inverted coasters, it is Wicked Twister at 215 ft.

Gatekeeper's label had Country of Origin on it. Picture from TPR.

Given how Kings Island just tore down 2 prototype rides and have had trouble with them in the past, I'm leaning towards the park not getting one, even if it comes from B&M (referring to the 4D).

B&M builds whatever Kings Island wants. Just because they built a giga somewhere doesn't automatically mean that KI's will be a giga. And to your remarks on the last invert being built in '06, there have been a few built in the last few years, heck, OzIris was new this year. Also realize most US parks by 2006 already had a B&M or Vekoma inverted coaster. Kings Island does not. Also, a B&M inverted coaster rides very differently from Invertigo, Flight Deck and Firehawk, not to mention it'd be a nice line chewer, something Kings Island needs, particularly in Action Zone where most ride lines can get pretty long.

Here's thing with the double footers. This picture has been used before on this thread without problem (it was taken from Drop Tower, it's not mine, I don't condone taking pictures from rides without permission), but it illustrates it perfectly. First, that truck fits between those pair of supports perfectly with enough room to spare on either side, which would easily fit a 4 across B&M inverted car. Double supports on B&M coasters above the tracks aren't nearly that wide on the final brakes. Secondly, those footers (starting from the top left) in the 4x3 square are the shed footers. The nearest footers to the right of that are inches from the shed footers. Here's Diamondback's for comparsion to illustrate how far the next footers over are for a sit down coaster, which are centered on the track above. DB's footers for the shed are also 4 wide. However, the next nearest footers from the footers at the edge of the shed on DB (which supports the main course track) are a good 5-7 ft over. Also, here are a few examples of Intamin brake run footers, and an example of why Intamin is completely ruled out at this point. Millennium Force Intimidator 305 Maverick We've already established where the brake run and station are going to be. Look at how on Intamin brake runs, the supports are numerous as well as pretty close together. They probably have dozens of footers supporting the final brakes and station alone. It's also like that throughout the main layouts; you can probably make their layouts out on the footers alone.

I have to go with Beast on this one. Its simply a marvel in the roller coaster world. It has such an eccentric layout, sprawled out over those dense woods. It definitely gives it it's own character, not to mention the legendary position the ride has attained, especially here in the Greater Cincinnati area. I kind of consider it the ride of passage around here, 'you haven't been on a real roller coaster until you've ridden The Beast', so to speak. I also love the history surrounding it, being built and designed by hand, the work the late John Allen put into it, the many modifications to the trains and tunnels on the track, simply extraordinary. It also has the greatest night time experience on any coaster I've ever ridden, period. I have to mention a close second for me, being Dollywood's Thunderhead. Whereas Beast is spread out, Thunderhead is a very intense and relentless ride. From the second the train disengages the chain, its nothing but mayhem; tons of air time and lateral forces throughout. It even seems every segment has some small dip or jump designed into them, it just never lets up until the final brakes. Millennium Flyers are pure win for wooden coaster trains. Of wooden coasters of the more classic variety, I have to go with Hershey Park's Comet. It is immaculately maintained and still rides like new despite being nearly 70 years old. It has great air time and a very nostalgic feel to it, kind of reminiscing back to the early days of amusement parks and roller coasters. Its a beauty at night too, rolling along the classic part of Hershey's midway strung up in lights. That's one ride I hope stays around a long time, an often under appreciated ride at Hershey IMO.

If this is a B&M ,there might be a lack of track because the plant is only about half an hour/40 minutes away. I don't recall Diamondback track showing up until mid-August, and that's a mile's worth of track, which went up really quick.

I realize that, but my point still stands. I want to see where you guys think this alleged giga will go using what we already see on the ground.

For those who overlaid I305 over SOB's spot, I would ask you go back and place the lift where the footers look like it'll be and then see where it'll go. Also take into account what the terrain is like and if you're going to draw a layout, explain all the current footers.

I'd like to throw in my 2 cents (or 2 dollars worth due to the length of this post) for trying to decode this thing and put some sense back into this topic. Okay, first of all, lets not forget what this ride is replacing. A ride as big as Son of Beast coming down with the following it had (hence the sale of the SOB parts) might call for a coaster of a similar stature, and given the fact they started pretty early is an indication that this will be pretty big, which to me, rules out an Intamin Blitz or anything of that nature. Also, Kings Island needs another line chewer. I'd like to pull out physical evidence at the park for this and not go by Don's Twitter speils or anything else of that nature (including the signs on the fence, owls and scarecrows) and no looking at silly things like footers shapes or bolt patterns (all steel coaster manufactures share those things with each other in one way or another). So we have footers in a big square shaped pattern on the ground, which indicate a likely spot for a train shed. The train shed, at least how I see it, is that rectangle consisting of footers in a pattern 4 across by 3 wide. The 4 footers which outline a similar size square to the shed's would probably be the transfer track area. Next to that are what most people see in the paired footers lined up next to them. The reason I bring that up is this would be the section with the final brakes. I would like to compare those with Diamondback's for a moment. Diamondback has alternating single and double footers. This one has all double footers at the specific final brake area (and likely station) which to me, looks like it'll be for the A-frames of an inverted coaster. I'll give some people the benefit of the doubt there as the land might be where it needs double footers for track with the train above the track, I.E. a standard sit down coaster, which given what this is replacing, give the impression of a giga coaster. I don't get anyone thinking there will be the turn right next to Delirium with the lift right next to Sling Shot. The footers don't indicate a lift of any kind, and the fact there isn't a room for a lift anyhow there (yes, I'm saying lift, I don't think this won't be a launch coaster). The lift would end up going extremely close to Sling Shot and over Adventure Express' entrance or out into the Oktoberfest lake at that angle, which you couldn't put a first drop from a giga or an inverted coaster there (or for any type for that matter). I'm fairly certain the station will be in the gap between Adventure Express and Flight Deck, whereas it'll have a final turn or something coming behind Delirium. The lift would go out behind Adventure Express or somewhere into the area where Son of Beast used to be (there could be a turn before the lift, Leviathan has a turn between the station and the lift, too). Heck, with the station that high up, they could pull a Hydra and put a pre-lift inversion there. Also, to the giga speculators, I have to ask you at this point; where is the clearing outside the Son of Beast area? They've only been working in the old Son of Beast spot. Do you guys realize how much room a 300+ ft lift and drop takes, even if its a curved drop, not to mention the rest of the layout? Go take a look at any giga coaster and see the distance from the base of the lift to the bottom of the first drop, including on steeper hills like I-305 and Millennium Force. You'd have to have the bottom of the first drop WAY at the end of the old Rose Bowl section, and from there, it'd probably have to go behind X-base or behind Flight Deck (I'm not sure how much land the park owns between FD and GWL). Even a compact course like that of I-305 would take a HUGE amount of room, probably surpassing SOB's old footprint. That's just after the first drop. Giga's also average around a mile or more of track spread out over a pretty large area to burn off that speed (90+ mph). You'd probably need track all the way out by Dinosaurs Alive to accommodate such a monster. Right now, there's no extra clearing around the perimeter of SOB's old grounds. I'm seeing it that the project will be substantially smaller than what most people are expecting, at least not to the scale of a giga coaster. With an inverted coaster, you can get creative with inversions as turn-arounds that use less space than that huge hammerhead on Leviathan or the massive overbank on Millennium Force. Cobra rolls and immelmans take up much less room, plus if you want any evidence of a large compact inverted coaster from B&M, look at Pyrenees. 147 ft tall, 6 inversions, over 4,000 ft of track in a pretty tight space. I know there are other manufactures, but frankly, I look at their current products and most of them don't have things that meet something that would fit Kings Island at the current moment. I get the feeling Kings Island wants to stay away from prototypes given the trouble they've caused the park in the past. Some have new stuff that could work, like Intamin's and Vekoma's new 4 across seating, Mack starting to build bigger with new train designs, Mauer Sohne has some neat spin off's of their X-car, but most of that stuff either hasn't been tried or hasn't been used a lot, which Cedar Fair generally stays away from. Gerstlauer doesn't come to mind as most of their designs are more compact than what we're seeing at Kings Island. But even something as big as Takabisha @ Fuji Q wouldn't have the capacity Kings Island is looking for. Premier has made a comeback recently with the likes of Sky Rocket, Superman and Full Throttle, but with my thoughts that this won't be a launch coaster (Premier's bread and butter right now), I don't see them either. S&S is ruled out as aside from launch coasters and 4D's (which they layout doesn't indicate, most are clones of X2) they're really small (Steel Hawg at Indiana Beach for example) and again, are newer designs. Zamperla or Pinfari- no, just no. That leaves B&M and Intamin, which the only Intmain I see is a giga (though they do have a full circuit inverted design, but only 3 have been built, a looper like Thorpe's Colossus would be too redundant IMO with Vortex doing its thing) and with my thoughts on the lack of clearing, I'm ruling it out. With that said, I don't see this as a prototype coaster in any way, shape, or form. So let's narrow down B&M types. I'll rule out flyer and sit down looper since Kings Island has both. Stand ups are a REALLY dead type, so that's out. I'm going to trust in Ouimet's words in his interview on Gatekeeper's opening day and rule out wing coaster. I'm not convinced with the lack of clearing so I'm ruling out giga. That leaves inverted, floorless and dive coasters. I'm ruling out dive coaster as the footers in the area behind Sling Shot looks too compact for a 8-10 wide car to maneuver through, plus the elevation changes concern me as dive coasters run out of momentum quick, so I tend not to lean on dive coaster. I think floorless is a different enough experience from Vortex to work. Being exposed like that above the track compared to Vortex's tight confines would be a pretty unique experience. Kings Island is also one of the only park's of its size without a full circuit inverted coaster (which I'm surprised KI didn't end up with a Vekoma SLC instead of Invertigo), which I keep that option open as well.

OzIris would like to disagree with you on the shapes and the number of bolts.

Snappy transitions and turns not banked as much are two different things. You could use the same argument on a lot of wooden coasters out there. Adventure Express' transitions aren't all that bad compared to Backlot because it doesn't have to twist as far (less of an angle differentiation to rotate), and because the turns aren't banked as much, you do get the slamming into the side. If AE were banked more, it would probably require OTSR's or as you said, leg restraints. You can control your upper body enough to get by with the lap bars only on Adventure Express. Arrow sit down car wheels also have substantial gaps between wheels which let it shimmy more than a B&M, Intamin or Premier. Also realize Ron Toomer's technology at his disposal during his era is probably leagues beneath what they had for Backlot and Flight of Fear, not to mention the man designed rides with a coat hanger.

If OTSR's are mainly to prevent the upper body from moving too much and Premier designed their foot braces to replace those bars, then I'd say a big reason is for those snappy transitions throughout the ride, mainly the banking from the launch to the helix and the s-curve sections; the police scene before the overbank, the curves before the dive into the subway stairs, and the trick track in the tunnel. It shares that trait with Flight of Fear in spades. Having a solid footing makes it easier for one to control the upper body. That's probably a reason why Backlot is rated at the highest thrill level on the park's scale.

Is there something involving Xavier University going on at Kings Island? I'm pretty sure that's their mascot costume.

If I were to go by physical evidence I see, I tend to see more people backing away from going up the Eiffel Tower than people wavering from the queue of Drop Tower. Sure its probably a small group sample; just telling it how I see it.

^Those went to Heide Park's wing coaster for 2014.

I would take about any job at KI over two particular places in the park to work- the Reds HOF Grille (at least back when it was WINGS) and Festhaus, especially closing them. Not only were they the two most popular eateries in the park, but both required extensive amounts of time after the park was closed to tidy up for the next day. I remember having to close WINGS on a weekday (10 pm closing) and not getting out of the park until about 12:30-1 am. Also, I must tip my hat to those working security and those who are life guards at Kings Island, both of which are jobs I probably would avoid myself considering all the potential stuff both jobs might have to deal with. I also try and have good fun with ride ops with all the stuff they go through as well, plus the fact that we as guests couldn't enjoy our favorite rides without them. I won't go into how, but I've had experiences with the group who runs first aid and they do a wonderful job as well.

You guys do realize if parks need room, they'll make room, right?

Because...you know...300 ft drops at near vertical angles at 90+ mph are SO family friendly. And btw, giga's have high g forces as well. Just sayin'.

Can we just agree that people like Intamin and B&M and be done with it, at least on this thread? Its annoying reading the same conversation brought up multiple times. You guys can always start another thread on the B&M and Intamin debate and leave this thread for, well, decoding.

Uh..have guys seen how much room Montu, Alpengiest and Katun take up?

I just got back from the Balloon Glow at Coney Island, and I must say, it was a tremendous experience for me as a musician. It was a real treat for me to have played there, in a jazz band no less, much like Moonlite Gardens once brought in those many years ago. I know we played across from it in the gazebo, but I still count it as having played there. We pulled out tunes like In The Mood, American Patrol, and Tequila and it went extremely well. Mark that as another famous venue I've played, with a list including Madison Square Gardens, the Superdome, and Ohio Stadium.