Alpengeist
- Thread starter Zachary
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Shane said:
In case anyone hasn't seen them yet. Courtesy of ScreamScape.com
Absolutely gorgeous.
I'm really interested to experience Alpie with the new restraints. I had the best ride experience even on here, last train of the night, only 4 of us on the ride, so dark outside it was hard to remember what was coming next. Hopefully with the right care and upkeep, Alpie can stay a great ride for years to come.
(Just so anyone who reads this knows, Alpie doesn't have the new restraints- we're all just wishing it did.)
I wouldn't be so sure. They never shopped out their newer model of the standup trains to parks that bought their older, awful ones.
Shane said:
I'm with Shane on this!
B&M trains are expensive. The trains with new restraints have to drastically improve the ride for a park to consider replacing the original ones. I don't see many parks dishing out money for them.
From what I remember, Apollo's Chariot and Raging Bull trains cost roughly $600,000 EACH back in 1999. I don't know what they cost now but if they were that much 16 years ago they'd definitely be a lot more now.
The trains were just replaced last year. If the park really wanted the new vests on the trains, they would've purchased them already.
Not sure if the actual physical trains were fully replaced, but the ride was running MUCH smoother and the seats weren't their usual beat up self (they got the molded Griffon/Apollo style seats, so I assume the trains underwent a serious rehab last summer.
To me, it felt like it got rougher last year. I'm not disagreeing with you, it does look like the harnesses got fresh paint, but nothing really major seemed to be done. I don't think it's out of the question that Alpengeist may get Banshee Trains soon.
Each restraint probably got its dimensional foam material stripped and re-molded atop its underlying (and retained, not replaced) steel restraint bar. Not knowing the details of how B&M do it, I will say that a great many other manufacturers do it that way, and the B&M restraints appear to have the same general foam-on-steel fabrication approach.
Maybe B&M's recommended maintenance calendar forces even the underlying steel components of the restraint bar to be replaced every so often - say, after 15 years? - due to the difficulty of inspecting the bars regularly when most of the steel is covered in urethane foam. But inspection is probably quite easy when the foam is replaced every so often, making scheduled replacement unnecessary... and the part of the bar I'd spend most of my time inspecting would be the welded pivot connection point, which isn't foamed at all and therefore can be inspected at any time.
Whatever the details may be, they're a very very far cry from replacing the trains. In my life I have yet to see a Mercedes declared a total loss just because the seats and headrests have upholstery damage.
Maybe B&M's recommended maintenance calendar forces even the underlying steel components of the restraint bar to be replaced every so often - say, after 15 years? - due to the difficulty of inspecting the bars regularly when most of the steel is covered in urethane foam. But inspection is probably quite easy when the foam is replaced every so often, making scheduled replacement unnecessary... and the part of the bar I'd spend most of my time inspecting would be the welded pivot connection point, which isn't foamed at all and therefore can be inspected at any time.
Whatever the details may be, they're a very very far cry from replacing the trains. In my life I have yet to see a Mercedes declared a total loss just because the seats and headrests have upholstery damage.
halfabee said:
I could see this. Every year Busch Gardens restraints always look brand spanking new and it they were repaints I think that would start to show over time. Not bashing Kings Dominion here, but they only have one B&M, Dominator and its restraints are discolored and have some foam chunks missing in some places. I imagine if BGW just repainted them every year we would see a lot my deterioration on them then we do.
I think we can agree it is unlikly that BGW will purchase new trains for Alpengiest, but I also unfortunately don't see the trains getting retrofitted with the new restraint system either. I don't know exact dimensions, but the new Banshee trains seating area appears to we wider than B&M's former Invert train design. While I guess it is possible to make the trains a bit wider, what effect would that have on the ride envelope?
