Drop Tower unexpectedly dropped out of the 2022 season.
(Not my pun)
Photo from KingsDominion Fanatics
(Not my pun)
Photo from KingsDominion Fanatics
We have an important update to share regarding our Drop Tower drop tower.
After 19 seasons in operation, Drop Tower, as you know it, is being retired.
However, Kings Dominion’s legacy of ride innovation continues. Our team is hard at work, creating a new and reimagined ride experience.
We'Il share more details and information at a later date.
After 19 seasons in operation, Drop Tower, as you know it, is being retired.
However, Kings Dominion’s legacy of ride innovation continues. Our team is hard at work, creating a new and reimagined ride experience.
We'Il share more details and information at a later date.
They’re mounting the seats upside down for the worlds first inverted drop tower.
Intamin is pissed at CF anyways, I doubt it’s a priority for them.
They really need to have a heart to heart about their feelings and put that behind them. People need to talk more!
To be clear, he said not a priority and not that they are just ignoring it. From a business stand point it really makes sense for Intamin to place priority on pretty much everyone besides Cedar Fair.
Actually, OTOH, who's to say they are even ordering the part from Intamin. Below-Grade-Depot probably has a better deal.
So what you are saying is CF more sneakily does what SEAS does - being cheap.
FWIW I’ve heard rumors from people in other parks that Intamin is just a pain to deal with in general. I’ve heard they don’t often keep repair parts readily accessible and often have to produce the part when things break down
FWIW I’ve heard rumors from people in other parks that Intamin is just a pain to deal with in general. I’ve heard they don’t often keep repair parts readily accessible and often have to produce the part when things break down
I've heard the same basic things here - if it's not a smaller regular replacement wear and tear part, it's got to be produced in Europe and shipped over... Which can take a long time.
Granted, how many coaster/tower ride elevator lift motors should be sitting on a shelf ready to go, so to speak?
Avalanche at KD got a new lift motor from Mack within about a week if I remember correctly.
B&M is really fast too. Don’t both have a US base of operations.
Mack ships from and stores everything in Germany.
Should have a few. Especially since CF has quite a few one off prototype designs. Hershey has 3 like that and they go through the same struggles.
Harnesses, wheels, and other regularly replaced wear and tear items should be.
Since I honestly don't know, would a good amount of parts used on this model of drop tower be interchangable with other models and/or other types of rides?
I'd think if so then it'd be more efficient to keep such parts in stock. If not, and there's not but so many of these rides out there, then I could understand it being less practical to warehouse items that may or may not ever be sold.
you can get them at Harbor Freight for a steal!
When it comes to their Intamin rides, absolutely. I really think the animosity towards Intamin has caused them to look at using lower quality hardware as a win-win in that they save money and, if it breaks, it looks bad on Intamin (because clearly the majority of the coaster community will blame Intamin over Cedar Fair). My hope is that the fact that the below-grade hardware caused a serious near-death injury that maybe they are looking at it differently but I think there is a lot of effort on CP/CF's part that is specifically trying to make Intamin look really bad -- and it's sadly working. It's always seemed to be the case pre-Covid that an Intamin that goes down at a Cedar Fair park sits unrepaired for a lot longer than any other park. They also seem to go down a lot more often than Intamins outside of Cedar Fair.
Aside from supply chain issues after Covid, it never seemed like Hershey had much of an issue getting parts in. I whole heartedly believe that B&M is a lot easier to work with than Intamin but I think there is also reasons for that since Intamin does A LOT of stuff in various sectors. Personally, I believe that a big (possibly the biggest reason) for CF's animosity toward Intamin is actually that CP/CF got a lot of extra treatment from Intamin in the 2000s because they were the only regional park (in NA) actually buying their rides. Intamin had more ability to go above and beyond what they were contracted for. In the 2010's when Intamin was getting really popular they had other things going on..... Intamin likely stuck closer to what their actual terms were and Cedar Fair acted like they were the giant that deserved Intamin's full attention. I think a lot of the issues in this relationship boil down to CF's arrogance -- and I think the same goes for other companies like S&S where CP maintenance removed VertiGo's car for the winter despite it being required for stability of the towers and then put all the blame on S&S...... Or the rumored hatred against RMC...... and who knows how many other ride vendors.
So yea, Intamin might not be as easy to work with as B&M but the "being a pain to deal with" seems to be a Cedar Fair thing.
I think this really is a lot of the situation with Intamin. They design very unique attractions across the board. You could have a park filled with Intamin coasters and not have the issue of having duplicate experiences. and this creates a giant pros vs cons argument. There are huge benefits to that but a downfall is they also have unique parts. This is just the nature of the beast. As for drop tower, though, this could just be an issue of shipping delays even if they have the part in stock.
To be fair, I don't know if that's the part at all related to this particular issue, just that it seems elevator components on various rides are usually the main issue for large parts biting the dust and needing replacement.
But could did Intamin design the lifts so that theoretically they could take a spare for I305 and use it on Drop Tower or Eiffel Tower? My guess is probably not.
But could did Intamin design the lifts so that theoretically they could take a spare for I305 and use it on Drop Tower or Eiffel Tower? My guess is probably not.