Hercules-Another coaster bites the dust.

[bockzilla]

I just received my copy of ACE News and the lead article is about Hercules at Dorney Park being dismantled due to the high cost of maintenance and being unpopular with guests. This year was my first trip to Dorney and I got to ride Hercules. After riding it and reading the article today, I can understand the parks decision. It was a very rough ride and after the first drop into the high speed curve and the rest of the ride was very boring. Since my opinion is about the ride after all of the modifications, I would like to hear your comments about the ride (before or during some of the changes). The article does state that it is being replaced with a B&M floorless model.

having never rode the coaster I really can't tell you what you want but I did pull up the pics on rcdb.com and it looks to be a decent ride (I love the woodies) but what exactly is it being replaced by. The ride was pretty new beings that it was built in 1989 (was it a better ride b/f the changes were made to it?).

Well, Thats Cedar Fair for ya. They don't take care of their woodies and barely ever do trackwork on them, and then their surprised when guests don't like it. Hercules could've probably been a great coaster if it wasn't owned by Cedar Fair.

[bockzilla]

I have to disagree with you on this one. Cedar Fair did not own the park until 1994 and the coaster was built in 1989, so Dorney had retracked and modified the coaster every year and when Cedar Fair took over they also retracked and modified the coaster to try to get it to appeal to the guests. All attempts seem to have failed. I think it just happens to be a problem with most large woodies. They just don't seem to keep the thrills of a smaller woodie that everyone seem to love. Just take a look at what has been done to other large woodies (Texas Giant, Rattler, Mean Streak) and even SOB has its problems. I say keep the woodies under 150ft and let the steel coasters go for the height.