Divebomb: Intamin Vetical Lift Coaster

Right, that's what I thought. Obviously I'm not going to make a B&M pulling -1.2 on every hill... or really a B&M that does that on any hill, or any coaster that does that... and this is only in the back row of the first drop, nowhere else. Otherwise the Gs are actually pretty controlled for an Intamin. I'm honestly more worried the two air hills aren't impactful enough at -0.4 than the slightly high Gs in the back on the drop. I'm not positive how to figure it out with any real accuracy but I believe it's steeper than 97deg anyway. I could be wrong. It definitely was but it's been reprofiled a number of times and now is probably closer.

Plus, (even though I've never actually ridden it) I can almost guarantee the first drop on El Toro pulls more than -1.2 in the backrow.

Since Intamin are renowned for their ejector, I usually try and aim for around -1 on most hills., maybe tapering it off a bit to -0.5 towards the end of the ride.

[Coasterkidmwm]

zacattack1104 wrote:

Lift supports and transfer track/storage shed are up. Turns out the track actually runs OK with 4 trains.

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One side of the lift supports are kind of a mess/nightmare because there's track in the way of where a major support should go. I don't know if my current solution is reasonable. SOS.

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Make the main shape of the supports into a triangle shape instead of a square (like TTD) so that you can avoid that issue. The random floating pole propped up by the two others just looks odd.

I'm not sure if this type of coaster reach more than -1g even for a moment in the back row i mean in this type of coaster there is only 3 cars per train. But it's your coaster you can reach the G's what you want I was only speaking in terms of realism.

Hmmm that triangle idea isn't a bad one Coasterkidd; the problem is I still don't know if there's room on that side of the lift. I'm on my Mac side so I can't open NL2 right this second to check. That would definitely be more elegant than Ckidd's arch suggestion, but do you think the arch would work if there's simply no room for the triangle?

El Rekko, some Eurofighters and/or El Locos pull those kind of forces on their drops or elsewhere and they have much shorter trains. Train length is only part of it. There's only one Int. veritcal lift, so it's not as though there's some giant precedent. Even if Fahrenheit's Gs aren't quite as intense-- which I don't even think is true as I've been on Fahrenheit dozens of times but it's not like I rode with a meter-- there's no trend yet. One is not a trend. Not to mention Maverick also has 3 cars and pulls some pretty strong negatives in the back row on the first drop. It has an entirely different profile but still, it's an Intamin with short trains and a crazy intense drop from the back. I am basing this partially on Fahrenheit, but far more from Intamin's full catalog of coasters, which I believe this fits into just fine strictly in terms of forces.

Like I said, if anything the air hills are the bigger issue. Projektion that's what I try to do, too... the second hill is more of a bunny hop so works just fine but that first one was meant to be a huge ejector moment. I think it got screwy as the lift changed sizes.

More pics later...thanks everyone.

zacattack1104 wrote:

Hmmm that triangle idea isn't a bad one Coasterkidd; the problem is I still don't know if there's room on that side of the lift. I'm on my Mac side so I can't open NL2 right this second to check. That would definitely be more elegant than Ckidd's arch suggestion, but do you think the arch would work if there's simply no room for the triangle?

El Rekko, some Eurofighters and/or El Locos pull those kind of forces on their drops or elsewhere and they have much shorter trains. Train length is only part of it. There's only one Int. veritcal lift, so it's not as though there's some giant precedent. Even if Fahrenheit's Gs aren't quite as intense-- which I don't even think is true as I've been on Fahrenheit dozens of times but it's not like I rode with a meter-- there's no trend yet. There's only one. I am basing this partially on Fahrenheit, but far more from Intamin's full catalog of coasters, which I believe this fits into just fine strictly in terms of forces.

Yeah that why I said "i'm not fan" because i don't try to reach this negative g's in my coaster. I've alway thought steel coasters doen't go over -1.1 g's but you are provably right, for moment with this kind of drop it's very reasonable.

I really wasn't trying to be nasty about it or anything and there's nothing wrong with being restrained in your own designs. The truth is that I worked on that drop for so long that at this point, it's either too steep to get it much less or I am incapable of doing it by hand. I don't know which it is, but there it stands. I mean I wasn't making stuff up before or anything and to the best of my knowledge there are definitely modern steel coasters that pull those kind of forces, but I'm not pretending to be the singular font of knowledge about coasters or anything. Not to mention G-forces are usually the one statistic not readily available for a lot of rides. Obviously there are ways to get this information but it's much easier finding just about everything else (height, speed, etc.).

Side note Projektion I have also heard the same about El Toro in the back. I would really guess based on my own experiences that Fahrenheit pulls a solid -1 in the very back but maybe not. I live in New Jersey so I'm pretty close to both GAdv (home park) and Hershey.

I'm pretty sure the little hill before the turn into the brakes on Fahrenheit reaches over -1, plus Skyrush has been recorded at over -2. When you look at it logically rather than just numbers, you're being tossed to the ground with an initial speed > 0 and at an angle >90. Its almost natural and unavoidable for it to be > -1 for even the briefest of moments.

Also the triangle supports would work best, but if you went with the arch, a literal arch since a square arch leaves all the stress from the vertical column on the center of the horizontal beam.

Okay, that's what I thought to all of that. The arch doesn't seem very intamin-y, makes me think more of Zierer and Wicked. I better figure out how to do the triangle somehow.

Just to be clear, did everyone mean for me to basically do the same style supports as TTD on the lift here, or to stick to the Int. vertical lift style supports found on Fahrenheit and like I have now but with a triangular shape versus rectangular? Sorry I have so many questions, most of the time my rides don't even end up supported...

Projektion wrote:

Plus, (even though I've never actually ridden it) I can almost guarantee the first drop on El Toro pulls more than -1.2 in the backrow.

Since Intamin are renowned for their ejector, I usually try and aim for around -1 on most hills., maybe tapering it off a bit to -0.5 towards the end of the ride.

I would say that almost isn't strong enough. Rides like this should have a lot higher than -1, Maverick's airtime hill's are pretty close too -2 and it's drop probably has around 1.5 at least. This seems to be based more around Fahrenheit though so it is fine if it's lower. Just remember that if you're going for modern Intamin, the transitions are insanely quick and the airtime can almost be painful at some points.

CoasterGuy2000 wrote:

Projektion wrote:

Plus, (even though I've never actually ridden it) I can almost guarantee the first drop on El Toro pulls more than -1.2 in the backrow.

Since Intamin are renowned for their ejector, I usually try and aim for around -1 on most hills., maybe tapering it off a bit to -0.5 towards the end of the ride.

I would say that almost isn't strong enough. Rides like this should have a lot higher than -1, Maverick's airtime hill's are pretty close too -2 and it's drop probably has around 1.5 at least. This seems to be based more around Fahrenheit though so it is fine if it's lower. Just remember that if you're going for modern Intamin, the transitions are insanely quick and the airtime can almost be painful at some points.

Well theoretically at -2g you nose start bleeding... People are not used to negative g and tend to exaggerate. I did a quick reasearch of maverick g-forces but I got no results.

It probably doesn't actually hit 2 but it and other Intamin's like Sky Rush definitely get higher than 1.5. If you want comparison, B&M hyper that people complain have no airtime pull somewhere in the -.3(Older) to -.7(Newer)

CoasterGuy2000 wrote:

Projektion wrote:

Plus, (even though I've never actually ridden it) I can almost guarantee the first drop on El Toro pulls more than -1.2 in the backrow.

Since Intamin are renowned for their ejector, I usually try and aim for around -1 on most hills., maybe tapering it off a bit to -0.5 towards the end of the ride.

I would say that almost isn't strong enough. Rides like this should have a lot higher than -1, Maverick's airtime hill's are pretty close too -2 and it's drop probably has around 1.5 at least. This seems to be based more around Fahrenheit though so it is fine if it's lower. Just remember that if you're going for modern Intamin, the transitions are insanely quick and the airtime can almost be painful at some points.

I usually aim for -1g, but given the length of the trains sometimes, there are going to be deviations. Like in an Intamin Prefab I'm working on in FVD, the airtime hills are set to -1g, but given the length of the train, the front and back usually deviate closer to -1.6-ish.


As for B&M's, if you measure the airtime from the middle of the train (the only spot in the train where you will feel the exact forces the ride was designed around), all their airtime hills are designed to be perfect 0g.

Triangle lift supports still weren't doing it so I actually went for a more pentagonal thing. It's definitely not perfect (and still needs a bunch of detail-related things around) but does this work well enough to keep? Just the basic shape, that is. Yes I see that one square footer lol.

I can only worry so much of some of the specifics being discussed here. While I want this ride to be relatively realistic and relatively Intamin-y, the big goal is to have a solid track that's 100% custom supported for the first time. If the shaping isn't perfect everywhere (or anywhere) so be it, although I think it actually turned out quite well in some spots. Still wish that first air hill was bigger... But by all means, carry on the conversation!

edit: I actually have one more version of the lift supports if the above if no good. I'm not really sure the alternate is better so no sense in posting it yet.

Have you attempted to use inspiration from the the other intamins at Hershey? I looking at Inamin top hats should help give you some more ideas on how to solve your problem. Most relevant to the style you're going for seems to be Storm Runner and ispeed

Yeah I have considered that, I honestly just hadn't gotten to that point yet. I don't think I have a choice now. I had really, really wanted to do the vertical lift supports as they are on Fahrenheit-- not for any particular reason, I just think they look cool-- but clearly there just isn't room on the one side and top-hat-like supports will indeed probably look better here.

I think you're right that the iSpeed/SR style or something close to it will be my best bet. From what I can see it appears that most of the supports on those top hats fall under the track, versus spreading out much to the sides? I think that's exactly what I need here. Obviously I have some room, just not a lot.

I guess the biggest difference is that I'll have to bring those SR/iSpeed supports up higher than they are on the real-life examples because the actual self-supporting arch is much narrower in this case yes?

[mkingy]

elRekko wrote:

Well theoretically at -2g you nose start bleeding... People are not used to negative g and tend to exaggerate. I did a quick reasearch of maverick g-forces but I got no results.

Completely agree. The problem with guessing G-Force is you don't have anything easy to reference it to in terms of factual data. Everything is relative as you don't know what you've experienced because the data isn't readily available and the complex nature of the conditions surrounding you when you go on a ride. Basically - if you can't back it up with factual evidence its almost worthless. For example I can tell you TTD launches at approx 1.36 because I know factually its top speed and duration to get to that speed.

Ride looks good though only just noticed it! You'll definitely need the supports up higher for the exact reason you stated - keep up the good work!

Thanks mking! Also helpful with the G-force musings. Truthfully I'd be a little more comfortable if I could get the back row less than that -1.2 on the drop, but I think it's OK as it is and if I mess with the drop too much more there will be a collision.

I think the big problem is with the G-force hard numbers too is that often we get them right from the horse's mouth, but whether or not *they* have gotten it from a place of pure fact is sometimes up for debate. I'm sure I'm not the only person who's spoken to someone higher up at SFGAdv and was told ET pulls -1.2++ in the back on the drop-- I see this mentioned all the time-- but I have no idea if this is coming from a G-force meter or from their own pretty little heads.

I will return with pictures ASAP. I'm hesitant to move forward with the rest of the supports until I feel like I've settled on a lift support shape. I think the iSpeed/SR top hat supports will work fine but I can't quite visualize how they'll work as they come closer to the ground. I'm sure I'll figure out something.

Kind of a cross between the iSpeed/SR top hat and vertical lift supports. In a rush but can provide other angles upon request.

Also there's one misplaced support but it's not super noticeable in the picture. Already taken care of.

At the moment, it feels a bit under supported, maybe add a bit more support onto the side without the track underneath/in the way.

edit: nevermind, I just opened up the image full size and saw that there was already a support there.

mkingy wrote:

elRekko wrote:

Well theoretically at -2g you nose start bleeding... People are not used to negative g and tend to exaggerate. I did a quick reasearch of maverick g-forces but I got no results.

Completely agree. The problem with guessing G-Force is you don't have anything easy to reference it to in terms of factual data. Everything is relative as you don't know what you've experienced because the data isn't readily available and the complex nature of the conditions surrounding you when you go on a ride. Basically - if you can't back it up with factual evidence its almost worthless. For example I can tell you TTD launches at approx 1.36 because I know factually its top speed and duration to get to that speed.

Ride looks good though only just noticed it! You'll definitely need the supports up higher for the exact reason you stated - keep up the good work!

Personally, I have more reason to believe TTD is closer to 2.3. As for a lot of my G-force estimates, they usually come from experimenting in NL2 and FVD by remaking sections of rides to see how the g's react. Like with the prefab I mentioned before I'm working on, it has a first drop similar to El toro, and it pulls around about -1.2 to -1.4 -ish g's in the back seats during the drop, which is what makes me believe that El Toro pulls more than/around about -1.2g.

Sorry I should have been more clear that not all the lift supports have been placed anyway so you are right it's a little undersupported. I still have to do some stuff around the bottoms of the supports but since I've now done four or five different versions I just wanted to post with the basic shape/major supports to make sure I finally have the basis of something that should work.

[mkingy]

Projektion wrote:

Personally, I have more reason to believe TTD is closer to 2.3.

Ah yeah - no I can believe that - It completely went over my head that hydraulic launches aren't exactly consistent throughout the launch! Your estimates seem reasonable anyway.

I haven't made a lot of progress as I just haven't been on the PC side much but I'm starting up again. I think I already asked in the thread but it might have gotten buried as an edit; would anyone mind taking a look at this for layout/pacing/shaping purposes?

I will take a look.

[TTD03]

Looking good and I'll take a look!