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Europa Park | Voltron | Mack Rides Stryker Coaster | 2024

The park's French Social Media Manager made a few remarks about the project in this French interview.
- The coaster won't be finished for the start of the 2023 season. Opening will more likely be late 2023.
- It will be a new MackRides coaster, a new prototype with many innovations, many super interesting elements based on the Big Dipper [.. .] There will be many new elements that have never before been seen in a Mack coaster, or in any coaster at all.
- It will be the cornerstone of a new themed area, initially there will only be the coaster. The area will be expanded and other attractions added later.


The mention of the opening being late in the year sparked some discussion on the EPFriends forum - eventually Parkleiter Lukas Metzger (1 of the 2 documentary series presenters) chipped in:
In the next construction documentation on Thursday we will go into this topic.

Spoilers: You won't like it - neither do we. But unfortunately some things cannot be changed.
Click to expand...
Source
 
Ahhh i was waiting to hear a timeline before booking a trip to Europa. But now i'm thinking i should just go this year and next >.<

The fact they are starting construction already for a coaster that won't be finished until the latter half of 2023 seems to suggest this might have more tricks up it's sleeves than i anticipated. Will be interesting to hear what they say on Thursday about that. Although i guess they are building a whole new area, not just a coaster. Interesting to hear about the new elements never seen on a coaster before... a vertical launch/lift has already been done as far i'm aware (wicked @ Lagoon) so i wonder what it will be? (unless i've missed a full confirmed layout anywhere?)
 
If it’s not done by August next year then all the more reason to push my Europa + Paris parks trip to 2024, I suppose. Was hoping to pair this with Toutatis.
 
CSLKennyNI said:
New construction documentary episode tomorrow.
Click to expand...
It's out. Regarding the timeline, they said some electrical parts have a delivery time of up to 60 weeks, which is more than a year, so they aim to have it ready sometime in late 2023 but cannot confirm it.

The coaster will be themed towards Tesla's beaming experiments, so there will be two towers at each end of the layout and you will be beamed from one building to another by Tesla's newest invention. The tower on the building is probably point A and then there's the tower we saw with the spike, which will be point B.
 
bratcurry said:
It's out. Regarding the timeline, they said some electrical parts have a delivery time of up to 60 weeks, which is more than a year, so they aim to have it ready sometime in late 2023 but cannot confirm it.
Click to expand...
Yup, that sounds about right. Supply chain for equipment of this nature is currently in a complete mess across Europe (not so in tune with the situation in the rest of the world). It's causing grief left right and centre in the construction industry in general.
 
Some more detailed planning documents for the station ground floor/queue have surfaced.
Confirms:
- a normal standby queue line
- single riders line (significant given SRL doesn't exist anymore in EP having been replaced by Virtual Line)
- Timed ticket / Virtual Line queue (given both being written I assume it means if VL stops being used by the park someday it will switch over to a Voletarium style ticket system)

Also shows the queues led to a double sided lockers area (like Arthur and F.L.Y. use), before then heading up stairs into the coaster station above.
While on the opposite side at the exit guests can access the lockers before heading out through the exit shop.
Capture_decran_727.png

Capture_decran_729.png

Capture_decran_730.png

The latest construction documentary episode also mentioned the outdoor queue section will feature a lot of water fountains and features given in the story the station building was formerly a hydro-electric plant. The final brake run will also pass over part of it along the side of the stream.

Another potential tease in that episode is in the Mack NeXT offices speaking with designer Matthias (about their research into Croatia, how and why EP chooses which parts of countries to recreate and creative choices in the coaster station building) on the floor against the wall are some books on Romania.
1661442320696-png.14545

Screenshot_2022-08-26_at_12.40.32.png

Back in late 2020 when Michael Mack announced this new coaster would finally come in 2023 he did also say two themed areas would also be added to the park over the next decade. Obviously we know Croatia is one with the Big(ger) Dipper as the first part kicking it's slow growth over the next few years.
After Croatia the rest of their expansion plot presumably will be taken up by the second area. Romania has been rumoured for years so perhaps (if not another misdirect for fun in the series) that might have been a little tease to the future. Certainly would be a theme with great potential.

Lastly Mack yesterday filed a trademark for "Voltron".

DPMAregister | Marken - Registerauskunft

DPMAregister stellt die amtliche Publikationsplattform des DPMA dar, mit Hilfe derer das Amt die Veröffentlichungen vornimmt, die im Rahmen der anhängigen Verfahren im Patent-, Gebrauchsmuster-, Marken- und Designsachen gesetzlich vorgesehen sind.
register.dpma.de

Which is odd because they already back in February trademarked 'Voltron Coaster' (hence why most have presumed since that would be the ride's name). Maybe they've decided to drop having 'coaster' in the official name?
 
CSLKennyNI said:
Lastly Mack yesterday filed a trademark for "Voltron".

DPMAregister | Marken - Registerauskunft

DPMAregister stellt die amtliche Publikationsplattform des DPMA dar, mit Hilfe derer das Amt die Veröffentlichungen vornimmt, die im Rahmen der anhängigen Verfahren im Patent-, Gebrauchsmuster-, Marken- und Designsachen gesetzlich vorgesehen sind.
register.dpma.de
Which is odd because they already back in February trademarked 'Voltron Coaster' (hence why most have presumed since that would be the ride's name). Maybe they've decided to drop having 'coaster' in the official name?
Click to expand...
Or....."Voltron Coaster"'s the name of the model and just "Voltron" is the name of the ride?
 
Loving the concept, the idea of the coaster being the bolt of electricity between two Tesla towers is genius and I adore it already. Really hoping Europa splash out on this one and theme it brilliantly, I'm sure they will if the artwork is anything to go by.
 
That artwork looks brilliant, so stoked for this. 😍 Hope though that they will be a bit less aggressive with their sponsoring / advertisement / product placement here and not put random Teslas in each corner :rolleyes:

(That's the one thing I don't like about Europa-Park, each queue line keeps on reminding you that they want to milk every penny out of the business. I'd actually like to forget about those things after I payed my admission fee at the entrance and just enjoy the immersion into another world...)

Regardless of that, I hope this will be the true stand-out coaster they need (and that Mack definitely is able to design!). According to what I've seen, from the theming it certainly is. From the track layout, it definitely looks exciting. Let's hope it is a similarly well-rounded ride experience as some of the other great Macks (like RTH or Helix).
 
Last edited:
Okay from those Rust planning documents someone on CoasterFriends.de has spotted an interesting feature.

Anyone not wanting potential spoilers for the indoor parts of this ride *look away now*



Numbering and colours from Mario M of CoasterFriends

index.php

1 - normal track
2 - Final Brake Run
3 - curve into station
4 & 5- Station
6 - curve out of the station over the exit shop
7 - track passes through a room marked 'effect track'
8 - start of the launch
9 - Vertical Launch up through the Wardenclyffe Tower (likely given the dotted lines for the track end here & the tower on the concepts is in the middle of the building over the entrance)


The room marked 'effect track' is intriguing. Ceiling height of 8,75m (track is about 5m high - neighbouring rooms fitting under the track have 2,85m and 2,95m heights). Beside it is a space labelled nitrogen/compressed gas storage - typically for hydraulic systems/cylinders.
index.php

Seems there could be some potential trick track element here in a show scene? Part of me has doubts for the sake of timing with how quick operations need to be for the desired 8 train ops and Silver Star level capacity. However there certainly appears to be something happening here.

Interestingly Mack does actually have a patent for a vertical transport/drop track element

DPMAregister | Originaldokument - DE102016109373A1

DPMAregister stellt die amtliche Publikationsplattform des DPMA dar, mit Hilfe derer das Amt die Veröffentlichungen vornimmt, die im Rahmen der anhängigen Verfahren im Patent-, Gebrauchsmuster-, Marken- und Designsachen gesetzlich vorgesehen sind.
register.dpma.de
 
CSLKennyNI said:
Okay from those Rust planning documents someone on CoasterFriends.de has spotted an interesting feature.

Anyone not wanting potential spoilers for the indoor parts of this ride *look away now*



Numbering and colours from Mario M of CoasterFriends

index.php

1 - normal track
2 - Final Brake Run
3 - curve into station
4 & 5- Station
6 - curve out of the station over the exit shop
7 - track passes through a room marked 'effect track'
8 - start of the launch
9 - Vertical Launch up through the Wardenclyffe Tower (likely given the dotted lines for the track end here & the tower on the concepts is in the middle of the building over the entrance)


The room marked 'effect track' is intriguing. Ceiling height of 8,75m (track is about 5m high - neighbouring rooms fitting under the track have 2,85m and 2,95m heights). Beside it is a space labelled nitrogen/compressed gas storage - typically for hydraulic systems/cylinders.
index.php

Seems there could be some potential trick track element here in a show scene? Part of me has doubts for the sake of timing with how quick operations need to be for the desired 8 train ops and Silver Star level capacity. However there certainly appears to be something happening here.

Interestingly Mack does actually have a patent for a vertical transport/drop track element

DPMAregister | Originaldokument - DE102016109373A1

DPMAregister stellt die amtliche Publikationsplattform des DPMA dar, mit Hilfe derer das Amt die Veröffentlichungen vornimmt, die im Rahmen der anhängigen Verfahren im Patent-, Gebrauchsmuster-, Marken- und Designsachen gesetzlich vorgesehen sind.
register.dpma.de
Click to expand...
So if I'm looking at this right the station will have a separate load and unload platform that hold one train each, similar to Blue Fire? Either that or it will load and unload two trains at once and dispatch them together like some Intamins and Gerstlauers. I'm going for the first option due to the effect track room.
 
I’m imagining something like the beginning of Movie Park’s Studio Tour where you enter a set of tire drives that jerks the train back and forth a bit. Something that could be done without halting the overall momentum if they want to keep capacity up.
 
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