How is a roller coaster moved?

[jokersrevengefan]

Hi everyone!

I'm looking for some information about how roller coasters are physically moved, like when a coaster is moved from one park to another.

Are there companies that specifically do this? Do parks have a team dedicated to moving coasters, or that a contractor's role? Do you know of any companies that do this now, or have done it in the past?

I'd love any information anyone can give me on this topic, including leads on people in the business I can talk to about it.

I'm a writer, and I'm working on a piece on this topic.

Thanks!

 

[Christian]

From what I have seen at parks which have moved coasters they will just dismantle the coaster into pieces (usually with cranes) put them on trucks and drive them away. When the ride is shipped away they will either clear away the footers or re use them for something else. When building a re used coaster it's basically the same thing as building a brand new one. Read the Flamingo Land 10 inversion thread about info on how a old coaster is assembled. Usually it's the normal test and mark the land, pour the footers and then start the vertical construction. There are also more mobile coasters which sit on steel frames and therfore dont require footers. These things are therefore easier to move. I am by no means an expert in coaster moving.

 

[Hyde]

Indeed, if the coaster is to be relocated, the coaster is carefully disassembled, bolt-by-bolt, piece-by-piece, to then be carted to the new location.

For a complete scrappage/teardown, it's a far simpler procedure. For wooden coasters, method of preferred execution is by crane/winch, pulling down the structure. For steel coasters, lots of saw-zaws and cutting torches to scrap the metal into smaller pieces for recycling.

 

[The Undead Creature]

the coaster is carefully disassembled

Saying nothing....... ?

I've moved enough rides to know that a single method rarely works for everything. It all depends on the type of ride, how far it needs to go, what equipment you have available etc.

Companies like RCS specialise in ride construction and relocation, they do literally everything for you and even bring all their own equipment. At the other end of the spectrum, you could dismantle the ride yourself, pack it up into containers and have it picked up by the buyer.

Dismantling a coaster is actually fairly straighforward, the majority of track sections tend to come apart quite easy and they all fit neatly into standard shipping containers.
The fun starts however when you come across a peice of track that doesn't do what you expect it to do when you take out the last bolt. This can range from a section refusing to separate, I've had to subject stubborn track to some serious pain with a very large hammer to get them to budge. To sections that are all too eager to get away from each other, had a bolt that was tight to the very last thread only for the tack to spring apart, sending the bolt flying across the ride and into the car park........ some poor sod needed a new windscreen.

Dismantling rides is far from a gentle process, hell even new ride construction can get pretty violent when you have to break out the 10Kg persuader.

 

[Hyde]

To clarify careful; recognizable enough to put it back together if possible.

 

[The Undead Creature]

Well to put it into perspective, the track for the new coaster at Flamingoland looks like it has literally been dragged half way round the world....