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Innovative coaster models that never 'hit the big time'

CoasterCrazy

CoasterCrazy

Giga Poster
In an era where the theme park industry is prolific worldwide, the 'staple of the amusement park', the roller coasters of course, are getting bigger, faster, safer and increasingly crazy. We've seen some absurd concepts be realised over the years, and as competition augments, there is increased pressure on offering new, unique experiences, whilst minimising the cost. Some of these fail however.

Some designs are just plain mad, but many, I feel, deserve many more installations...I'll detail a few.

The Vekoma Stingray: - The next generation of the Vekoma flying Dutchman, which offers a compact footprint and unique elements. Perhaps the Theoretical hourly ride capacity is the reason why this has only had one installation so far, although others are rumored.

Vekoma-Stingray-flying-coaster.jpg


[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGLOxkaf9oU[/youtube]

And a few others:

Schwarzkopf Silver Arrow - Only three were actually built, despite numerous relocations

GCI Big fun - Such a brilliant deal for a small UK park....

So what do you think? What coaster models are too prolific? What would you love to see built in the Uk?:--D

Thought I'd mark the occasion of my 1000th post with something prominent....
 
Tbh, I was hoping on Flamingo Land building a vekoma stingray or a big fun, we can say good by to the stingray, but the big fun my still be on the line.
 
It's hard to say the GCI big fun hasn't taken off since the first one hasn't even opened yet, pump the brakes on that one.

Other than that, the 4D coaster, but that was due to roughness and expenses. Would've loved to have seen a different layout instead of the same drop, raven turn, flip, turn, half-half (full-full), raven turn, done.
 
Schwarzkopf Silver Arrow - Only three were actually built, despite numerous relocations
Click to expand...

They had a few different layouts for them compact loopers, so it's not that much of a surprise really. And they were hardly unique like the Stingray.
 
I always thought it was a shame that nobody else went for a tilt coaster. It would have been great to see one with a bit more of an extensive layout after the drop. I have no idea how much they cost or how reliable they are, which makes it difficult to judge why nobody else went with the idea really.

I guess it could be that after the initial tilt/drop you're basically left with a regular Vekoma looper, which just don't get built anymore.
 
Not sure if anyone who has ridden it would disagree with me, but I wish there more rides like "Bullet" from Flamingo Land. I think its an interesting answer to vekoma's boomerang.
 
The entire idea of the tilt coaster took ages to take off as well... Wasn't the next moving track ride after that Everest?

Winjas has tilt track, though. But that and tilt coaster are literally the only ones. Must be a reason why. Must be a complicated faff.

Sent from my HTC Wildfire S A510e using Tapatalk 2
 
I'd like to see some more Schwarzkopf's Münchner Bahns, since the original one is probably forever lost
 
Ok if the mega-lite already have got a couple of mentions I'm going to say Intamin prefabricated wooden coasters. There have only been built four of them, just like the mega-lites, although the first model was built way earlier back in 2001. I can see why most parks considering a large airtime coaster go for a B&M hyper instead. But the prefab is cheaper, has almost as high capacity and with a prefab you're almost guaranteed a top 10 ride in the world! Especially the last part is a very good marketing tool that I thought more parks would be interested in!
 
Im also going for the mega-lites as well, they have awesome airtime, always get great reviews, have a small footprint and cheap. It's strange that a U.K and a U.S.A park have never bought into one.
 
^The thing is is that the mega-lites aren't all that cheap, they aren't B&M money but you could buy 2-3 El Locos for their price, and both have about the same marketability.

For mine I'd have to say the S&S free-fly, dire capacity but so original and just WTF.
 
1. The Intamin AquaTrax: Great launch, AMAZING airtime, you can soak your hands in the water, lots of turns, a motorbike coaster mixed with a water coaster, and of course, the Aqua Trax element thing. Just lots of cool elements that make Atlantis Adventure such a great ride.

2. The Vekoma Tilt Coaster: It took so many years to design, overall just a great ride and the tilt element is probably the coolest element ever made. Now I have to pay 15,000 dollars and go to Taiwan to ride it.

3. The B&M Mega Lite: OK...so it's not really a "mega lite" but It's the 145 foot tall twisty airtime galore coaster, Hollywood Dream: The Ride. Now it's running backwards and I never got to ride it forwards.
 
Bottom_Feeder_13 said:
^The thing is is that the mega-lites aren't all that cheap, they aren't B&M money but you could buy 2-3 El Locos for their price, and both have about the same marketability.
Click to expand...

I agree, but I think it's such a poor, short-sighted way of viewing things.

I think we can all agree that the majority of theme park goers are casual and just got to maybe one park every year or two - yes?

So for most people, what they usually want is a new ride every - let's say - other time they arrive. It keeps the park fresh for people to return. Or does it?

Let's compare say Alton Towers to Flamingoland. Both have roughly the same number of coasters. If Alton Towers had the same coaster selection as Flamingoland, do you think they're still have the same constant number of visits each year? Apart from capacity issues, would a Volare have the same queues as Air? Would Kumali get people as excited as Nemesis? El-Loco instead of Oblivion? We'll leave the booster bike vs. Rita debate for another day :lol:

Yes, people turn up and love to see new rides, but they also want a degree of high quality rides while they're there. When people arrive at Alton, you hear them going over Forbidden Valley "That's Air, I love Air it's my favourite ride!" Okay, they're misguided idiots ( ;) :p ), but they have a strong opinion about the rides and they understand the ride "branding". If a ride is poor, then the branding is also poor.

I honestly don't know how much brand/coaster awareness there is with people who visit Flamingoland, but I doubt people will be excited about the Volare as people get about Air.

That impacts on return visits. "Shall we go to Flamingoland or Alton?" or even "Thorpe or Flamingoland" and you'll get the response of the one with the bigger, better rides. Mumbo Jumbo may have been good to market as the steepest coaster or whatever, but once people have been on it, they'll know it's all bull and no substance - even compared to Saw which is a substantial ride.

If Oakwood was to get a Megalite, I'd be back there every year. As it was, even before I was "an enthusiast", I would deliberately try and get a holiday each year somewhere close so that I could make a day trip to Oakwood - just for Megafobia. If they had bought an El-Loco and way back in 2000 (the first year I went) were pushing it as "the steepest coaster in the world", I wouldn't have really thought much of it, and wouldn't have returned.

Sadly, the one "brilliant" coaster can't help Oakwood with the problem of being in the arse end of nowhere, but if they had a second good backup coaster (note, Speed didn't help them really did it?), then it may tempt people back; but it really needs to be in a much more popular tourist attraction area.

So yeah, I think that a quick "easily marketable" installation is very short sighted if you're looking at the long term of the park. So investing in a "superb" off-the-shelf coaster that may coast more than a quick fix, but less than a custom build, is actually a very good investment if you want your park to be taken seriously.

Or you can just take the cash quick while you can grab it and live constantly from installation to installation revenue...
 
Thanks for all the replies to the topic.

How about the Schwarzkopf Jumbo V? The only existing model is Pleasurewood's enigma, but with a compact footprint it is, in fact surprisingly forceful in places, and could've rivaled the subsequent S&MC Hurricanes that existed more than ten years later.

It was also one of my initial credits, so I have a soft spot for it...:--D
 
It's pretty much the same as all the others though isn't it? Okay, Knightmare and Lisebergbananarama were built by somebody else, but essentially they're the evolution of that design, which is an evolution of the other Jumbo Jet models and Wildcat models (kind of). At the time, the models hit as big as they were going to (though Anton's poor business sense didn't help). They were outclassed by larger companies doing much more impressive things and naturally died off really...
 
marc said:
The Vekoma tilt coaster only ever got built once as well.
Click to expand...

First one that came to my mind too.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOd3mAnrsBM[/youtube]

POV for those that may not have seen it. It's ridiculous. **** being front row on that.
 
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