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The Beast Roughness/jerking


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47 minutes ago, BuckeyeBond said:

You nailed it!! I love the intensity of Voyage. Voyage also shatters The Beast in airtime. Voyage also has much better laterals, it's really not even compared IMO. Voyage also provides just as good of a night ride if not better than The Beast. Also the Voyage doesn't have a ton of straight track. IMO that's the worst part about The Beast, just way to much long straight sections. Now don't get me wrong, I still love The Beast. It's still a top 5 woodie in my book. But when comparing The Beast & Voyage the only thing I found comparable was they go about the same speed and both provide amazing night rides. Other than that Voyage takes the cake in my book.

That's what kills The Beast for me is those long boring straight sections.

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I have not ridden that many wooden coasters (9 total so far), but of the ones I have been on, I feel Beast is actually among the smoother of the bunch (and is my current favorite woodie mainly due to the epic night rides). It was a bit rougher feeling in 2017, I do still think smoothness wise 2014 was its best year by far that I have ridden it, and of course the brand-new Mystic Timbers is gonna be smoother. But Beast may have a case for #2- and even my roughest rides on Beast (wheel seats usually) were far from unbearable, I have had much worse. (Legend @ Holiday World would probably be the other wooden coaster that could make a claim for 2nd smoothest, though I have not ridden it since 2013 and it got the GCI Re-Track a few seasons ago, and apparently it is even smoother now)

In fact, probably the roughest single ride I ever got on ANY coaster was on the aforementioned a few posts ago Voyage, in August 2011. Holiday World was expecting the Timberliners to be ready and thought they could skip re-tracking as much that year. Ouch, I don't think so. The ride was still fun and very intense, just painful fun due to the added roughness. 2013 was better (it had gotten re-tracked by then), but the 2nd half of the ride after the triple down was still pretty rough at points. I have not re-visited Holiday World since 2013, but apparently this section needs work often as they are re-tracking it again for the 2018 season. Hopefully it runs well in 2018, I had some of my best coaster rides ever on it in 2010 and would like to see Voyage get back to that state.

Back to Beast: I also kinda think the ride does benefit from a LITTLE roughness, as it helps enhance the sense of speed, which is one of the things Beast is all about. As long as it does not go overboard, which I don't feel has happened in my 22 rides on it so far, it's fine. I'd be OK with a re-track of course (Not a RMC conversion or layout change however, those would be excessive and un-needed), but TBH, Racer needs that a bit more than Beast in my opinion right now- it felt like it was the rougher of the two coasters last year.

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5 hours ago, BuckeyeBond said:

You nailed it!! I love the intensity of Voyage. Voyage also shatters The Beast in airtime. Voyage also has much better laterals, it's really not even compared IMO. Voyage also provides just as good of a night ride if not better than The Beast. Also the Voyage doesn't have a ton of straight track. IMO that's the worst part about The Beast, just way to much long straight sections. Now don't get me wrong, I still love The Beast. It's still a top 5 woodie in my book. But when comparing The Beast & Voyage the only thing I found comparable was they go about the same speed and both provide amazing night rides. Other than that Voyage takes the cake in my book.

Beast was never trying to attempt to have a large amount of air time. It's main features were the low running to the ground, the tunnels, and the double helix at the end. Saying you think Voyage is better because of the air time is like saying you like Banshee more than The Racer because of the loops.

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^ I'm with you on that with Voyage. During Holiwood Nights a few years ago, I rode that 5 straight times and had to sit out after a while because I thought it shook my brain around and gave me a headache. My one friend rode it like 25 straight times. I don't know how he did it.

For me with The Beast, I don't mind that long straight track going into the brake tunnel or the long stretch of track before the second hill. In my opinion, it kind of prepares me for what's to come. I agree with another fan on here that it would be cool to add another hill in there for air time moments, but would they still have to add a brake somewhere along the way? That's my only question. I guess I'd have to experiment building The Beast in roller coaster tycoon to figure that out.

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The Beast isn't that rough. Sure it's not perfect, but it's not as bad as Blue Racer. Blue Racer has gotten rough in the last five years. Personally I wouldn't mind if GCI retracked the whole coaster, and gave it Millennium Flyers. (Though they'd have to be REALLY long Millennium Flyers.)

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The Beast is my favorite coaster.  I know the sweet spot where to ride, and the only times I get a bad ride is on train 2.  I don't know why, but this train seems to give rougher rides than 1 or 3--so much so that I will let people go ahead of me if my train is #2.  Besides that, I think The Beast is running really well and gives very smooth rides.

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  • 1 year later...

After reading this thread I had three rides in the middle car avoiding a wheel seat and it made such a difference. My opinion of The Beast is it should never change, just TLC it a bit every year. It's a coaster that takes several rides to get to know it, a cranky old man that changes it moods with the weather and berates new riders who expect a ride like a GCI. My eight year old loves it because it scares her and to tell you the truth it can scare me sometimes because of its unpredictability. But a good ride on The Beast has a unique thrill that a new coaster can't give you, it's not something that you can draw or design. It can't be duplicated and that is why is it special.

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Yes, exactly. Not sitting on a wheel seat makes a world of a difference.. and although some parks may advise not to lean forward.. I lean forward and avoid getting my head smacked; I will not explicitly suggest that anyone else do it; it works for me however.

I will say, related to roughness.. I've found that Banshee has become unenjoyable to me at the bottoms of the hills. There is so much rattle. I've ridden a fair number of B&M inverts, including the very first at SFGAm, Batman.. but Banshee, one of the newest ones, somehow has aged to develop the worst B&M rattle that I've ever experienced. Diamondback only has the one moment, and it's still not that terrible, but I walked off Banshee with a headache the last time as did my sister who rode a different train. I don't understand what causes it, but I hope someone does understand why it's there this year, and they are able to help reduce it.

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On 2/9/2018 at 8:56 PM, spooky21 said:

I just wish they would have thrown in some more airtime hills or something. It's not a bad coaster by any means I still love it but like I said some airtime would have been nice.

If I'm remembering correctly, the brake shed which is the straightest part of the ride where you hit the aggressive magnetic brake at the end was originally a block brake for the ride. I don't think it really ever ran this way though. 

The first lift hill is really slow on this ride because it cannot send the train over until the train ahead of it has crested the second lift hill. When the first lift speeds up suddenly it's because that next block is totally clear. With the brake shed they would have been able to send the train on the first lift over before the second lift was clear.

It would not have functioned as a block brake section with hills there.

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