Technically Morgan isn’t defunct. Chance is technically Chance-Morgan, but Morgan is no longer a standalone and most of the products are Chance products.
Anaconda
- Thread starter I305Evan
- Start date
Whoa now, don't we already have two Premier launchers on either side of Lake Charles?
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Red is Anaconda’s layout. Black was Thunder Express.
Interesting that Anaconda has the only “Butterfly” element on a coaster…
Yeah that’s what they’re referring to. However the other name is a butterfly.
It's really interesting to me that Anaconda could have actually fit beautifully in that valley and used a terrain following layout at Dollywood.
That is a crazy piece of coaster lore there. Would LOVE to hear if anyone has some inside info on this one.
Was an Anaconda clone actually pitched to Dollywood in 1996/1997? Was there some crazy scenario where Anaconda was designed & proposed to Dollywood in the late 1980's, the deal fell through & KD picked up the ride? Or is it just a crazy coincidence that Anaconda fits the terrain of Dollywood? FASCINATING find here.
And flies in the face of the rumor I'd always heard of an extended Tennessee Tornado (where the ride would do a LEFT overbank after the last inversion instead of heading back to the station).
Was an Anaconda clone actually pitched to Dollywood in 1996/1997? Was there some crazy scenario where Anaconda was designed & proposed to Dollywood in the late 1980's, the deal fell through & KD picked up the ride? Or is it just a crazy coincidence that Anaconda fits the terrain of Dollywood? FASCINATING find here.
And flies in the face of the rumor I'd always heard of an extended Tennessee Tornado (where the ride would do a LEFT overbank after the last inversion instead of heading back to the station).
In a Discord server I’m in, they think they found a reason for that—the idea at the time was to get something new for Dollywood, and the mine train was a relocation that they got. We can see now that both were ideas, but it seems that because the mine train already existed and fit relatively well into existing landscaping at the time. The relocation would have been cheaper than a ground up coaster. Then along the way KD asked for a custom arrow looper and arrow could’ve responded with “Here’s a layout that we already have but haven’t built”
At least that’s what I took away from it.
At least that’s what I took away from it.
The problem I see with that, is the photo that the National Roller Coaster Museum posted shows proposed layouts, and one includes the former mine train. Not to mention, the layout makes way more sense to be a Dollywood unique ride, than a clone.
Don’t forget the butterfly element.
The timeline that the layout was proposed to Dollywood, then dollywood went with the mine train makes more sense (to me at least).
The mine train opened in 1989, and Anaconda opened at KD in 1991. Additionally, the mine train was a relocation and thus, cheaper, than a brand new full size arrow looper.
Don’t forget the butterfly element.
The timeline that the layout was proposed to Dollywood, then dollywood went with the mine train makes more sense (to me at least).
The mine train opened in 1989, and Anaconda opened at KD in 1991. Additionally, the mine train was a relocation and thus, cheaper, than a brand new full size arrow looper.
Is there any proof of this? I've certainly not seen any–just a bunch of people speculating.
Some guy in the r/coasters discord who’s a huge arrow historian and nut said they proposed it before settling on TNTOR’s actual layout
And I’m very happy they went with the custom layout, tn tor. Kicks ASS
He had no proof though, correct?
I can't fathom a reason why Arrow would be trying to sell Dollywood a clone of Anaconda by the time Tennessee Tornado was in development. Arrow design had advanced may years by that point.
I find the theory that Anaconda and Thunder Express' relocation were developed for Dollywood in parallel, Dollywood picked Thunder Express, and Arrow sold the discarded Dollywood layout to KD far more compelling personally. No evidence of course, but until I see some, I think every theory is just a theory.
A thought about the model, after too much time spent looking at the photo...
To my eye, it looks exactly as a model would look if it had been built in the 80s to drive a decision between two ride options depicted with pushpins in meticulously layered foam core, and then dusted off and modified years later (removing some of those pins in the process) to depict a new ride using solid copper wire and tiny wire staples.
It looks like a lot of pins were removed from TE's station to make room for the TT wire. Those may all just be pencil dots showing TT's ground path, as are visible under TT's station exit and lift. But the dots under the station are really closely spaced. About as closely spaced as pins would be, had they originally stood there. Before being removed later to make room for the wire, leaving those marks as empty pinholes. Theoretically.
Which would only make sense if the pins were originally placed with no knowledge that there would be another modeled ride using exactly that same space later.
Additionally... while simple layered foam core models were still being handmade well into the 90s to support ride proposals in at least a few instances (i.e. occasionally), this model just seems super weird if it was built all at once in the late 90s using two completely different methods on the same old-school-style layered topo -- with one method depicting a soon-dead ride plus a newly proposed yet tired decade-old cloned design, and the other method depicting Arrow's state of the art.
I find it simpler and more circumstantially supportable to suspect this model was built once to support competing ideas from Arrow (pins), and then repurposed later (wire) during a separate era of Arrow's & Dollywood's history.
Which would imply that Anaconda was once a new, fresh, contemporary late-80s design proposal for Dollywood.
To my eye, it looks exactly as a model would look if it had been built in the 80s to drive a decision between two ride options depicted with pushpins in meticulously layered foam core, and then dusted off and modified years later (removing some of those pins in the process) to depict a new ride using solid copper wire and tiny wire staples.
It looks like a lot of pins were removed from TE's station to make room for the TT wire. Those may all just be pencil dots showing TT's ground path, as are visible under TT's station exit and lift. But the dots under the station are really closely spaced. About as closely spaced as pins would be, had they originally stood there. Before being removed later to make room for the wire, leaving those marks as empty pinholes. Theoretically.
Which would only make sense if the pins were originally placed with no knowledge that there would be another modeled ride using exactly that same space later.
Additionally... while simple layered foam core models were still being handmade well into the 90s to support ride proposals in at least a few instances (i.e. occasionally), this model just seems super weird if it was built all at once in the late 90s using two completely different methods on the same old-school-style layered topo -- with one method depicting a soon-dead ride plus a newly proposed yet tired decade-old cloned design, and the other method depicting Arrow's state of the art.
I find it simpler and more circumstantially supportable to suspect this model was built once to support competing ideas from Arrow (pins), and then repurposed later (wire) during a separate era of Arrow's & Dollywood's history.
Which would imply that Anaconda was once a new, fresh, contemporary late-80s design proposal for Dollywood.
I'd bet the farm on this scenario. Checks out! What an cool butterfly effect
Y’all complaining about a coaster that has more riders per annum than Volcano ever did.
