Holiday World 2019

[Oldiesmann]

Lots of changes coming to Holiday World next year...

In addition, according to NewsPlusNotes:
- New “Kids World” event for five weekends starting in mid-August 
- On-ride photos for Gobbler Getaway dark ride 
- Candy Cornucopia store and Dippin’ Dots Sundae Shoppe in the Thanksgiving section 
- Track improvements for The Voyage, the world’s second-longest wooden roller coaster 
- Additional Cabanas

[IndyGuy4KI]

So they focus on food offering for 2019. Interesting!

[BoddaH1994]

I wonder what “track improvements.”

[IndyGuy4KI]

4 minutes ago, BoddaH1994 said:

I wonder what “track improvements.”

They replaced about 400ft of track last year. It was the full structure too, not just the top layer.

[CoastersRZ]

I rode The Voyage back on Labor Day weekend this year, and it was incredibly rough.  Maybe it was because it was so hot when I visited, but it was a one and done for me.  It is a fun park to visit, but they haven`t really added anything of late that will cause me to want to visit.  Granted, I will take my son when is older and tall enough to ride their rides.  Thunderbird is still an amazing coaster.  

[BoddaH1994]

1 hour ago, IndyGuy4KI said:

They replaced about 400ft of track last year. It was the full structure too, not just the top layer.

Is that what they’re doing again this year?

I rode it last year, and as with Robbie, it was one and done for me. I’d heard that the track was always designed with the Timberliners in mind. I’m not an engineer, but it does seem like the layout is way too modern and aggressive for PTC trains. Just imagine Mystic Timbers with PTCs - same concept. 

[upstop]

I’m surprised they don’t do a Halloween and winter event at HW, but I imagine it’s basedbon their location and distance from civilization. 

[IndyGuy4KI]

9 hours ago, BoddaH1994 said:

Is that what they’re doing again this year?

I rode it last year, and as with Robbie, it was one and done for me. I’d heard that the track was always designed with the Timberliners in mind. I’m not an engineer, but it does seem like the layout is way too modern and aggressive for PTC trains. Just imagine Mystic Timbers with PTCs - same concept. 

I am just guessing that we will see a similar replacement type that we saw last year at Holiwood Nights. They seem to replace all the way to the  support structure when replacing track. Not sure why? 

[FoF96"]

I’m not sure when I visited but it was definitely some time this year, when I rode Voyage, it was actually very smooth.  

Edit: and I’m a fairly hard critic on voyage and I had the roughest ride ever several years back. I felt like my at the time 18 year old back needed corrective surgery.

Edited October 16, 2018 by FoF96"

[CoastersRZ]

3 hours ago, upstop said:

I’m surprised they don’t do a Halloween and winter event at HW, but I imagine it’s basedbon their location and distance from civilization. 

Holiday World does do a Halloween event.  It is called Happy Halloween Weekends.  Find out more information on their website here: https://www.holidayworld.com/ 

They do not do a winter event.  At least not yet.

[McSalsa]

I also rode Voyage this year, in late July. It was pretty hot but I felt the ride was much smoother this year than it was in 2011 and 2013, when I rode Voyage last. As a result, I loved how long and intense the ride was. However, wooden coasters can be moody. This year alone I have had both amazingly smooth and very rough rides on The Racer (both sides), for example. I would not be shocked to find Voyage is the same way, having its on/off days. One of my 2011 rides was among the roughest I have ever had on any roller coaster.

Also, Holiday World has, if I recall, given The Voyage major track work almost every single offseason. With most wooden coasters (Raven+Legend fit this bill), parks just have to replace the top layers of track, but The Voyage requires all of them to be replaced. Per RCDB, Voyage is 159 feet tall, which makes it the tallest surviving traditional (no prefab, no topper track) wooden roller coaster in the world. Wooden coasters begin to require a lot of maintenance and you have to start limiting what elements you do with them at around 125 feet, so The Voyage is a good amount beyond that. Add the fact the ride still uses PTC 2-bench trains, which while better at it than the 3 benches are not great at sharp turns and twists, of which Voyage has plenty, and the fact you have over 6,400 feet of track to maintain and it becomes clear how hard Voyage must be to keep running at a decent level. Holiday World's wood coaster team has to work very hard to keep this ride going.

I also don't think we are ever gonna see coasters like The Voyage again in my lifetime. Rides like Mean Streak, The Rattler, and Son of Beast (among others) have proven that classic wooden coasters have limits that need to be respected or the ride will have problems, possibly major ones. The Voyage really pushes those limits. If someone did try to build a even more extreme wooden coaster with old school track, it would probably end up being un-rideable quickly. But most parks now this by now, so I figure most future wooden coasters will either be smaller rides below 125 feet tall (or use terrain if they do go above that height) or use Intamin or RMC's modern track designs to increase the limits of what they can do, though at the expense of the "wooden" feel of the ride. The days of parks building 150+ foot traditional wooden coasters are probably over.

[flightoffear1996]

Is the Voyage even really a traditional roller coaster?  I believe the support are all steel.

[Oldiesmann]

5 hours ago, upstop said:

I’m surprised they don’t do a Halloween and winter event at HW, but I imagine it’s basedbon their location and distance from civilization. 

It's kind of hard to do a Halloween event when your park is themed to holidays. I don't think it has anything to do with location, as Knoebels does a Halloween event and they're even more "middle of nowhere" than Holiday World is.

[McSalsa]

27 minutes ago, flightoffear1996 said:

Is the Voyage even really a traditional roller coaster?  I believe the support are all steel.

In the case of wooden coasters, yes. Support structure really doesn't matter much- there are actually quite a few wooden coasters with steel support structures. For example, the Coney Island Cyclone in New York, one of the most famous roller coasters and built in 1927, has steel supports. And almost everyone recognizes it as wooden as well. Mainly, it is just the track that matters to what type of ride something is, not the structure. Which is why Gemini and Steel Vengeance, as well as Mine Trains, are considered Steel coasters even though they have wooden structures. Though I have seen some generally call them "hybrids" in a sense, for example some might list Voyage as "Wood/Hybrid (Steel Structure)".

But to further clarify, by "traditional" wooden coasters, I mean the old-school, cut and built on site track, aka what The Racer and Beast use, which is what most wooden coasters used (and nearly all of them until recently). They are still being made, GCI still uses traditional wooden track, for example. By "new style" I mean stuff like Intamin's prefab laser cut track, or RMC's Topper Track. The Voyage is actually the tallest and fastest wooden roller coaster to NOT use either of those.

Also, out of curiosity, if you do disqualify Voyage from traditional woodies just because it has a steel structure (you also have to DQ Coney Island Cyclone then) the tallest and fastest "all wooden, all traditional" wooden coasters are: The Boss at Six Flags St. Louis has the biggest drop at 150 feet, and thus the fastest speed at 66.3mph. But, the tallest is Wodan Timbur Coaster @ Europa Park, at a whopping...131 feet tall. (Hades 360 is taller than Wodan, but it also has a steel structure and would thus be DQ'd same as Voyage)

 

[SonofBaconator]

@McSalsa I consider supports part of the ride experience. When I worked at Cedar Point over the summer, I could see the wood in the supports on Steel Vengeance sway in response to the train going throughout certain parts of the ride. Compare that to steel supports on full steel coasters where there is much less swaying. I'm no expert, but I believe that if the supports of the Voyage were magically altered to be wood instead of steel, you'd get a completely different, more traditional, wooden coaster experience. 

My two cents.

[CoastersRZ]

The "sway" is a structural term known as deflection.  Yes, wood can deflect more than steel can.  But all structures, even buildings made of concrete will deflect some.  Go to the top of the Eiffel Tower on a windy day and you will be able to feel it moving due to the lateral load applied by the wind.

[IndyGuy4KI]

Blog post about Voyage track work.

https://www.holidayworld.com/holiblog/2019/03/15/lip-synch/?fbclid=IwAR3mlpOHfNXoB8iJceBNiiti-Tcp6UyIin-0FXs4bSDp_piJGwHfkewB9uo

[coasterfanatic83]

Whatever they did to The Voyage worked well. After riding about a dozen times at Holiwood Nights this weekend, I came away nothing but impressed. I was QUICKLY reminded why it is my favorite coaster.

Additionally, where does everybody stand on counting Mammoth/Wildebeest in your coaster credits? I asked a few people this weekend and got mixed reviews.

[McSalsa]

1 hour ago, coasterfanatic83 said:

Whatever they did to The Voyage worked well. After riding about a dozen times at Holiwood Nights this weekend, I came away nothing but impressed. I was QUICKLY reminded why it is my favorite coaster.

Additionally, where does everybody stand on counting Mammoth/Wildebeest in your coaster credits? I asked a few people this weekend and got mixed reviews.

I don't count Mammoth and Wildebeest as roller coasters, though if I did, they would both probably have a great shot at my Top 10. I like both of them even more than Raven & Thunderbird, and I think Raven and Thunderbird are great rides! I'm not normally huge into waterslides- especially if there are big waits for them- but I'll happily wait for those two.

[Kenban]

I have to give credit where and when it is due.  I was at Holiday World for Holiwood Nights over the weekend and Voyage is running better then I can ever remember.  In the past Voyage typically was a one and done experience for me and I rode close to a dozen times and I never would have done so on previous trips.  The ride is very smooth and I hope to continues into the future.

Every single coaster in the park is one that I am currently willing to jump right back in line and ride again.  Plus their reride policy is simple and enthusiast friendly, if there is no one waiting you can stay on, if there is someone just grab an empty seat if one is available.

[Oldiesmann]

As far as Mammoth and Wildebeest go, I count water coasters separately from regular coasters. I believe I've been on 3 or 4 of them now (both of the ones at HW, plus the one at The Beach in Mason and I believe the one at Kentucky Kingdom as well)

[IndyGuy4KI]

On 10/16/2018 at 7:46 AM, IndyGuy4KI said:

I am just guessing that we will see a similar replacement type that we saw last year at Holiwood Nights. They seem to replace all the way to the  support structure when replacing track. Not sure why? 

So you guys know me, I am not going to be shy about asking questions.  I asked maintenance during the Voyage walk back tour at HWN's why they go all the way down to the supports when replacing the track on their coasters. The answer is that they have Gravity Group come in and totally re-profile the track to the structure as it is now. I also asked about the harder woods that they have started using on Racer like was mentioned at CoasterStock by Jeff Gramke. He also confirmed that on certain areas of the track that get the most wear they have started using the harder wood.