silver2005

^I noticed a lot of the school group kids cutting through that area yesterday.

I would ballpark the average wait times between 20-40 minutes.

Starting to pick up now. There are 6 1/2 rows of buses in the parking lot.

For some reason, the chain grease on Vortex is super pungent today. Almost worthy of having to hold your nose.

Speaking of discount chain, the West Coast Racers at SFMM just recently went vertical.

I'm still blown away our Invertigo model still runs as good as it has in terms of lack of downtime, especially considering the fate of the rest of the Inverigo models. I think KI should keep it just entirely out of the fact that its such a rare model.

I guess I'll throw up my park rankings as well (I'm excluding the Disney and Universal Studios parks I've been to, they're in their own tier IMO)- 1. Dollywood 2. Hersheypark 3. Knoebels 4. Holiday World 5. Cedar Point 6. Kings Island 7. Kings Dominion 8. Dorney Park 9. Six Flags Great Adventure 10. Kentucky Kingdom 11. Waldameer 12. Michigan's Adventure Distant 13. Kennywood

^Thanks, I've been looking for photos of that area pre-KI.

Wait...that's the lake that the canoes were in, right? That was man made?

I will do top 10 from a wood and steel list as I separate the 2 due to the two having their own limitations that they can and can't do things like the other, and will only elaborate on the top 5 of each to keep the post short. I do have an entire ranking list on my About Me page in my profile, my coaster count being in my signature. Steel 10. Storm Runner 9. Phantom's Revenge 8. Rougarou 7. Medusa/Bizzaro 6. Banshee 5. Millennium Force- I love the drop. 300 ft at an 80 degree angle at 93 mph, just a pure speed machine through and through. It may not have a lot of strong forces, which is why its only at 5, but it makes up for it in keeping up its speed through the course, which is spread through the center of the park nicely. I'm also a fan of the Intamin trains being so open. 4. Diamondback- Great first drop as well with the benefit of having better forces than MF. Great airtime and 2 upward helices for some good positive g's. The V-trains don't pace as consistently as some other stock, which makes it unique in being one of the few B&M's that has a bit more difference in the front vs the back. 3. Nitro- This is nearly the same idea of Diamondback, but the 4 across trains pace better, it's got a better helix going up to the MCBR, and the 2 highly banked curved drops puts it over the top of Diamondback. 2. Magnum XL-200- A true classic. I like the more forceful Arrow transitions taken at the speeds it has. It's got a great location on the beach as well, though, the hills on the return run can be annoying from time to time. Good tunnels too, especially when they're at the crests of hills to create a lengthier head-chop effect. 1. Steel Vengeance- It's a good blend of speed, forceful elements, and the bigger elements at the beginning have a bit of grace to them as you fly over the top hat and the outside banked hill on the 2 hills following the lift. I think its forceful air is more comfortable than the likes of Maverick and Skyrush and the restraints are better, even if they have leg restraints that I'm normally not a fan of. Wood 10. Mystic Timbers 9. El Toro 8. Ravine Flyer II 7. Comet (HP) 6. Phoenix 5. Lightning Racer- Take the twisted goodness, surprise elements and pacing of a normal GCI and make it a pair that really takes advantage of its course, dueling back and forth with an intense race. 4. Thunderhead- I have to admit with these two, I'm nitpicking since this and LR are about equal IMO, but there a few things that T-head edges out from LR. First its got a good spot nestled in a valley adding in something of a terrain style to it, though its not married to it. Next is the fact that I prefer twister layouts on GCI's as there's more head choppers and more of a sense of being out of control. The station fly-through only adds to that feeling and its quite a unique moment I wish more coasters did. The section between the station fly-through and the final brakes is pure chaos, they somehow made it crank up the cylinders even though its late in the ride. 3. Beast- It is a bit weird for this to be here as its not as forceful or intense as its surrounding contenders, but its truly unique layout and length is what brings it up. I have Voyage a bit further down, and yes it is nearly as long, but it stays too intense for too long. I like coasters that long to have some sort of breather or some section where it lets up on the gas, but even with a MCBR, Voyage is a bit much for me. Beast makes it work because its a bit drawn out, but those lulls build anticipation for its more dramatic elements, my favorite parts being the first drop, the drops following tunnel #2, and the helix. Its location makes it feel like you're not in an amusement park anymore, more of a journey kind of layout than about any other coaster I've ridden. Superb at night. 2. Twister- I prefer this to GCI's for one soul reason- its not overly banked. And due to letting off on the curve angles, its a lateral G machine. Not only that, but its more compact course means it has a good variety and flow between different elements. One or two airtime filled hills usually follow into a high lateral curve, and that unexpected nature really helps. Even if you know that layout, its hard to anticipate the next element in a good way. 1. Legend- To me, this combines the elements from all 3 wooden layouts together very well. It starts with an out and back section that has 1 great drop after another and a good turnaround. As it comes back, it starts to adhere to the ground more for some terrain style elements, especially as it makes a few S-curve hills towards the helix, which, it then brings in twister elements as it darts under the structure. The ending is a great bang-bang way to end with similar variety of elements as Twister. Its just the right length, too. Also not banked too much to deliver insane lateral G's.

^When have the stats (and only the stats) of a single coaster been detriment to the park that built it?

This response pretty much sums my point in asking that question. That logic is highly, highly flawed and unsubstantiated. CP is its own park and KI is its own park. Sure, CF will probably do bits to let the two differentiate themselves, but there's enough unique going on at both parks that keeps them unique. This entire focus on how the stats will somehow make or break a coaster addition is nonsense and there is literally no evidence ever to back up that line of thought. I think this line of thought stems from enthusiasts not getting what they want and somehow making arguments to shift the burden that the parks' and parent company are somehow making these backroom decisions on how parks should flex a few stats here and there to make other parks seem more appealing. This line of thought is enthusiast entitlement through and through. We had this exact conversation about Banshee and whether or not it'd be bigger than Raptor unironically, which, the stats alone proved that notion false. Banshee and GateKeeper are entirely different types and were built for entirely different reasons. When they built GateKeeper, CP already had about every other type that'd you'd consider a staple already built. KI building Banshee was to plug up a lack of a staple being that most parks of KI's size had an inverted coaster in the line up, which can also be said about Diamondback. Now, the reason we didn't have those types was due to CP, but because they were in different chains, and once CF acquired KI, they rounded up the coaster lineup nicely, to fit what CF's park model is. Last time I checked, KI still draws in its fare share of out of market guests. This argument only works if KI was somehow not doing so and is somehow doing bad in business as a result of Banshee and Diamondback being a few hairs short on stats, which there is 0 correlation (additionally, the kind of business KI had the year they built Mystic Timbers also obliterates that argument). CF did have some slower growth last year and whatever becomes of this giga is a result of that, but CF obviously still sees KI successful enough to green light a giga, a type which only 5 other parks in the entire world have at this point. The whole argument of being disappointed by a giga coaster has to be one of the stupidest things that the enthusiast community has produced.

On the Firehawk trains-I'm guessing that SFA and Carowinds (I don't think they're compatible with Nighthawk anyhow) both plan on scrapping their Vekoma Flying Dutchman coaster and thus don't need KI's set.

I'm always nervous on Drop Towers, and on KI's, I know its a 7 second delay from when it stops rising before it drops and try to count it out, which, I fail miserably most of the time.

So going by your guys' logic, how did Diamondback and Banshee get to be bigger than Magnum and Raptor?

Every other decoding thread has veered off topic from time to time. Sometimes people's individual logical progression and frame of reference will have that happen. It's just how discussions happen. It also tends to lead to some occasional shennanigas, which are the parts of decoding threads I like.

The GP aren't gonna miss Firehawk like they do with SOB and X-Base is still an out of the way location enough to not be as visible as the Banshee and MT projects unless they go on rides, which, the GP aren't actively looking for construction stuff like we are.

There are some major differences between this project and Banshee and Mystic Timbers that may not warrant this project teasers. Banshee was replacing a pretty famous and, by far, the most polarizing ride in SOB and Mystic Timbers had to have the funnel cake stand be relocated and WWC moving its entrance the season it was being built, both major aesthetic differences. This project is kinda off the beaten path as X-Base is a dead end already.

As I am aware, the Golden Ticket Awards are highly skewed by parks' influences and thus I take what it says with a grain of salt.

I don't think RMC is equivalent to Intamin in terms of downtime or having major overhauls. A few anecdotal incidents aren't enough for me to be dissuaded from a RMC, and there isn't much of a pattern of RMC having the kind of faults that would affect them long term. They have a good track record despite a few hiccups.

Track decoding aside, I also hope they don't get too fancy on the trains and stick with the 4 across sets. Those things absolutely haul compared to the v arrangement seen on DB.

B&M tends to be cautious when they start a new model. Perhaps they've obtained enough info from Leviathan and Fury 325 to do away with the thick first drop support (kind of like how they don't use pre-drops anymore).

The only B&M backbone that looks different are the wider dive machine track to accommodate the wider trains. All the rest of the models will have identical looking track. EDIT: I think one other different track shaping B&M does is they tend to have taller backbones at the bottom of the taller drops on hypers/gigas.

I'm pretty sure the mods are sitting back with the biggest popcorn machine ever watching the servers start to spit fire.

I think DB was short of those 'as the bird flies' distance figures (unfortunately, my source is a long deleted post on a now defunct coaster forum), but factor in that a giga will have significantly taller elements, and it'll be well upwards of a mile. I do think within the layout, it won't be entirely big hill after big hill and there will be a stretch or 2 that lets it get some sustained speed. That's one feature that sets gigas apart from hypers, for the most part.