How much does it cost to maintain a roller coaster?

[theyoungentrepreneur]

I know it would depend to the size or how long the ride operated all throughout the year (without factual basis) but out of curiosity. How much does it cost to maintain a roller coaster? (The chain belt, the wheels, the coaster, the painting, Etc..)

Another question in my mind is what's the difference between Giga Coaster/Hyper Coaster/Mega Coaster? Is it just the name? And how much the prices of those would range?

Thank you if you answered my question.

 

[Gavin]

^Generally speaking, it's all about the height.

Mega and Hyper are basically the same thing, but different manufacturers use different terms. Anyway, they're over 200ft tall.

A Giga is anything over 300ft.

Mega, Hyper, and Giga generally refer to non-looping, non-launched coasters. Some examples ...

Modern Hyper/mega: Steel Force, Nitro, Bizarro (six flags new england), Behemoth, Diamondback

Giga: Millenium Force, Steel Dragon 2000, Intimidator 305

Prices? For a hyper, I'd take a rough guess that you're looking at a $15 million bare minimum. For a giga? Add at least another $10 million to $15 million or so. Maintenance? No idea.

Without sounding rude, the only people who can give you accurate prices for any of this will be the coaster manufacturers themselves, not a bunch of roller coaster fans.

 

[OfficialAltonTowers]

@ theyoungentrepreneur, what a name to be pricing up coasters, please invite me if you get a B&M in your back garden !!!,

Prices, Gavin has given you a pretty accurate representation of the cost to build a coaster, but to maintain, you're talking,

- monthly light grease on the chain and anti roll backs, max a few pounds/dollars
- daily inspections of the ride track and surrounding areas, few hundred quid to pay a trained engineer
- monthly/weekly/whenever needed, train and car strip downs, grease, oil, polish and shine, a few grand per train, its more the staff than the consumables
- wheels need replacing every now and then, quite expensive hard-wearing material
- brake fluids, coolant for propulsion systems (launched coasters),

I would sit here and make a page of rubbish that you don't need/want to know, but the basic cost is more of labour to hire a few fully trained engineers to do all of the work required, after that the consumables like oil grease and fluids are next to nothing, my company bring in about 500 tonnes of heavy weight refined grease per month and it only costs pennies per litre...