- August 28th, 2007, 10:15 am
#21884
It's going to only deteriorate more quickly over the years at this point. The first few seasons were smooth, then a little bit rougher every year, and it gets progressively worse (without major retracking). My theory on the reason it's gotten so bad is due to a major design flaw......a flat turn at the lowest point of the coaster at high speed. Now, I'm becoming a mechanical engineer, and IMO, this is the worst possible design for a turn, becuase unless the turn is 90 degrees, it's going to bounce and bang a lot as it isn't really redirecting the forces (as many curved drops do). My feeling is that within a few years, it will end up much like a coaster which suffered due to the same "flaw" (as I call it), Hercules. That giant flat turn at the bottom of the first hill was a maintenance nightmare, and the main reason that coaster got so rough, even re-tracking often would not solve it (nor did shrinking the turn in slightly in hopes of reducing the bounce). Again, this is all just my opinion, but I feel that eventually, within a few years, the maintenance costs of having to constantly retrack those flat turns is going to end up being too much.
As for Thunder Road, it has been hard for me to tell as I've only been on it 3-4 times this year, and 2 of those runs were reallly smooth and fast, the other 2 were quite rough, and neither 2 was before or after the construction, they were mixed. I guess weather conditions had a lot to do with that, unless you have 2 days of the same conditions, it's going to ride differently as a woodie. All I know is, with as rough as Hurler was when I went on it at the beginning of summer, TR became my main woodie (Hurler wasn't providing much airtime that day, but more than enough bouncing, jerking, and slamming.......ouch)
