Viking Fury receiving a new paint job!

[standbyme]

10 hours ago, IndyGuy4KI said:

Nitpicking is just fine. 

Will this be added to the TOS? 

[flightoffear1996]

14 hours ago, Shaggy said:

That pic is baffling...  For all intents, it makes sense that it would be 1980... but I guess it could be from early summer 1981.

If you look real close, some people are wearing shorts, the grass is pretty green and the foliage looks younger on the trees.

The former pad for Stadium of the Stars is still there... but the bleachers are not... I didn't find any ads for concerts in 1980 at KI past June.   There was a BJ Thomas concert at KI in spring 1981 I believe.  I assume he was a big enough draw to require the stadium?  There also doesn't seem to be any concerts held at Kings Island's Stadium of the Stars past May of 1981. 

Also, because I am a show nerd - I can easily tell that the show playing the American Heritage Music Hall is "That's Entertainment."  It played the 1980-81 seasons. There are obvious billboards in front of the theater that have cast "still shots" on them.  (Notice they are gone by 1982 - that's because "Celebration" was now in production.)

The Safari Amphitheater is not in use.  I believe in 1981, it sat dormant... but I dont know if it was used in 1980 either.  There was a Calypso band that played in that area of the park, but I don't think they played IN the amphitheater. There was, TMK, no bird show in 81 however.

The odd thing, of course, what appears to be coaster track in the parking lot.  It could be "The Bat" track.  But why on earth would they have additional track and/or supports left over after the coaster had opened?  Seems to me that would have been gone by 81... but then given it was a prototype, perhaps not?  Also, I know by looking through the pics that Mr Joiner took, they visited in both 1980 and 1981.  He took shots from the Eiffel Tower both times.

My eyes arent as good as they used to be, but maybe that is not track in the parking lot and, perhaps, remnants of bleachers from Stadium of the Stars?

Hmmmmmm....

Maybe because arrows were built on site?  Maybe it was just some left over steel kind of like when you build something out of wood you have left over scrap pieces. Just a guess. 

[TombraiderTy]

11 hours ago, IndyGuy4KI said:

Nitpicking is just fine. If you guys see other things missing/wrong please shoot me a PM and I will get it fixed.

@Shaggy, @TombraiderTy, @gforce1994

Oh no, you don't know how big a can of worms you just opened 

14 hours ago, Shaggy said:

That pic is baffling...  For all intents, it makes sense that it would be 1980... but I guess it could be from early summer 1981.

[In-depth analysis of photo]

After spending some more time looking it over, I'm fairly confident it's 1980. Here's some of the reasoning:

• WCPO 9 has an aerial video of Kings Island from 1980 (misdated as 1979) and you can see Stadium of Stars missing there too. I don't know if I've seen a 1981 photo/video with the venue, but it was a very temporary set-up and seems like it could've been easily assembled/disassembled as needed (though I do question why it wouldn't just be permanently kept up). 
• Referencing old show guides, it appears that the Wild Animal Safari amphitheater was dormant in 1980 but hosted The Caribbean Serenaders in 1981.
• Off of Facebook and now uploaded to KIC's gallery, you can see that all of Joiner's images have filenames. The one we're analyzing is just "193 PARK", but the preceding and succeeding ones are definitely 1980... The Bat construction sign, Turnpike not a construction site yet, etc... which I think is strong evidence this was 1980 too.

But don't worry, there's still a mystery (where would the fun be if there wasn't?! )

Screamin' Demon is running through its loop. Joiner had another photo, zoomed in a little on the old coaster...

If we zoom in even a little further and count the cars...

There appears to be (6) cars...  And zooming in on the station platform appears to back up the (6) cars claim, with 6 clusters of queuing guests:

(6) cars on Demon in 1980 completely contradicts everything I've ever read/seen about this ride and is throwing me for a loop (ba dum tss). The ride opened with 6 in 1977, but was down to only 5 by the end of its first season... and I've never seen any evidence of it returning to 6 car operation after, but this definitely changes that... And down another rabbit hole of KI history I go 

[gforce1994]

7 hours ago, TombraiderTy said:

Oh no, you don't know how big a can of worms you just opened 

After spending some more time looking it over, I'm fairly confident it's 1980. Here's some of the reasoning:

• WCPO 9 has an aerial video of Kings Island from 1980 (misdated as 1979) and you can see Stadium of Stars missing there too. I don't know if I've seen a 1981 photo/video with the venue, but it was a very temporary set-up and seems like it could've been easily assembled/disassembled as needed (though I do question why it wouldn't just be permanently kept up). 
• Referencing old show guides, it appears that the Wild Animal Safari amphitheater was dormant in 1980 but hosted The Caribbean Serenaders in 1981.
• Off of Facebook and now uploaded to KIC's gallery, you can see that all of Joiner's images have filenames. The one we're analyzing is just "193 PARK", but the preceding and succeeding ones are definitely 1980... The Bat construction sign, Turnpike not a construction site yet, etc... which I think is strong evidence this was 1980 too.

But don't worry, there's still a mystery (where would the fun be if there wasn't?! )

Screamin' Demon is running through its loop. Joiner had another photo, zoomed in a little on the old coaster...

If we zoom in even a little further and count the cars...

There appears to be (6) cars...  And zooming in on the station platform appears to back up the (6) cars claim, with 6 clusters of queuing guests:

(6) cars on Demon in 1980 completely contradicts everything I've ever read/seen about this ride and is throwing me for a loop (ba dum tss). The ride opened with 6 in 1977, but was down to only 5 by the end of its first season... and I've never seen any evidence of it returning to 6 car operation after, but this definitely changes that... And down another rabbit hole of KI history I go 

It was certainly 5 cars in 84. An enthusiast took photos of it and KC opening year and there’s 5 cars on it. 
 

Look at this great pic! 

 

[TombraiderTy]

Here's another picture of Viking Fury's new paint job, now from behind (courtesy Twitter user KyleKruthoffer):

I'm disappointed that they seemingly just coated the whole boat with one color, especially those windows... I wonder if any light from inside will shine through with those layers of dark paint applied on top.

For reference, here's a (slightly older) photo of the back of the boat. The big light on top was removed before the 2010 season.

[Shaggy]

1 minute ago, TombraiderTy said:

Here's another picture of Viking Fury's new paint job, now from behind (courtesy Twitter user KyleKruthoffer):

I'm disappointed that they seemingly just coated the whole boat with one color, especially those windows... I wonder if any light from inside will shine through with those layers of dark paint applied on top.

For reference, here's a (slightly older) photo of the back of the boat. The big light on top was removed before the 2010 season.

BTW - most know this, some may not, when it opened, there was a center mast with flags on it.

[TheBEASTunchained]

Truly a downgrade for Viking Fury. While it is nice to see attention being given to the ride, it was not done properly. 

[KIghostguy]

That’s a shame. After I saw how much effort went into bringing out the details on the International Street buildings last year, I was hoping to see the same effort on bringing out the details on Viking Fury. Sad to see that is not the case.

[gforce1994]

2 minutes ago, KIghostguy said:

That’s a shame. After I saw how much effort went into bringing out the details on the International Street buildings last year, I was hoping to see the same effort on bringing out the details on Viking Fury. Sad to see that is not the case.

They brought out a lot of details on the ship. In fact, they made it more historically accurate in regards to historical sailing ships.

[robintodd]

On 6/17/2020 at 4:36 PM, TombraiderTy said:

What @gforce1994 said is correct, but if you're updating the timeline then you may want to correct that Ferris Wheel opened mid-1978, not 1982. It was removed after the 1990 season and relocated to Libertyland amusement park in Tennessee. To nitpick, the text also jumps between present and paste tense.

 

Bayern Kurve was a circular, roller coaster like flat ride located where Sling Shot now sits. Here's a similar attraction (although Kings Island's never had a jet of water in the center):

 

Loved this ride. 

[dbackdreams]

Was that bone always on the ship or was it for hant

[NegativeGs]

On 6/16/2020 at 6:07 PM, KIghostguy said:

I don’t think so, Diamondback’s supports have more of a grayish tinge to them and Viking Fury’s new support color looks to be more like a cream color. I hope we see Diamondback next in line for a paint job, though.

Agreed, Diamondback needs a midlife face lift. It's one of the top hypercoasters in the US, in my opinion, but it's looking tired.

[gforce1994]

12 hours ago, Shaggy said:

BTW - most know this, some may not, when it opened, there was a center mast with flags on it.

Why did they take out the center mast? 

[standbyme]

I also would have liked to see a little more detail on the paint job...but overall it is still great to see it spruced up...especially with our current Covid conditions. I know money has to be tight for the park right now, so it’s nice that they still went to the trouble to do a project that could have easily been postponed another year. 

[TombraiderTy]

22 hours ago, gforce1994 said:

They brought out a lot of details on the ship. In fact, they made it more historically accurate in regards to historical sailing ships.

Are we looking at the same photo? As far as I can see, they covered all the details and didn't bring any of them out... I can't vouch for anything in terms of accuracy to historical sailing ships though.

20 hours ago, dbackdreams said:

Was that bone always on the ship or was it for hant

The skull and crossbones has always been on the ship. The whole theming package (skull, windows, figurehead, etc.) is standard on Intamin swinging ships.

[dbackdreams]

3 minutes ago, TombraiderTy said:

Are we looking at the same photo? As far as I can see, they covered all the details and didn't bring any of them out... I can't vouch for anything in terms of accuracy to historical sailing ships though.

The skull and crossbones has always been on the ship. The whole theming package (skull, windows, figurehead, etc.) is standard on Intamin swinging ships.

Well I like it but it used to scare me when I went to hant that one time but my no boo lighter kept the scary people away from me. What is intamin

[TombraiderTy]

Just now, dbackdreams said:

What is intamin

Intamin is a company from Switzerland that sold/manufactured many of Kings Island's rides, including Drop Tower, Viking Fury, Eiffel Tower, White Water Canyon, and Congo Falls. They've also manufactured some big roller coasters at other parks, like Millennium Force and Maverick up at Cedar Point.

[dbackdreams]

1 minute ago, TombraiderTy said:

Intamin is a company from Switzerland that sold/manufactured many of Kings Island's rides, including Drop Tower, Viking Fury, Eiffel Tower, White Water Canyon, and Congo Falls. They've also manufactured some big roller coasters at other parks, like Millennium Force and Maverick up at Cedar Point.

My dude that is awesome thanks you I hope the big tower on main streets l is open I can't spell sorry

[standbyme]

7 minutes ago, TombraiderTy said:

Are we looking at the same photo? As far as I can see, they covered all the details and didn't bring any of them out... 

Aye matey! I think he was referring to the fact that when these impressive vessels sailed the seven seas, glass had not yet been invented...so they used wood panels instead. (Life was much more brighter with the coming of glass.)

 

[Pagoda Gift Shop]

I wonder if they painted the mermaid on the front, I mean bow, brown also.

[TombraiderTy]

46 minutes ago, Pagoda Gift Shop said:

I wonder if they painted the mermaid on the front, I mean bow, brown also.

For what it's worth, the figurehead isn't a mermaid but just a normal woman.

I was wondering about her being repainted too - based off this March blog post, she doesn't appear to have been repainted a solid color, but possibly just repainted her original colors (or, possibly, she hadn't been painted yet at all in that photo).

As an aside, minor fun fact - that figurehead is standard on most Intamin swinging ships, but she typically doesn't have anything covering her top half. Kings Island is the only park I know of to have covered her.

[Pagoda Gift Shop]

Thanks for the correction.  Yeah I wasn't 100% sure she was a mermaid since the time that she was covered, whenever that was.  I did not look closely at the boat from the March blog post, but you are right that it appears that it had already been painted at that time.