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Intamin woodies and wheels

andrus

Giga Poster
A question that has bothered me for a while really. Why does Intamin use 4 wheel cars on their wooden coasters? The ones I've been on, Balder and Colossos, are both great but they rattle A LOT in the corners! So why not use 2 wheel cars like they do on their steel coasters? And GCI who use them on their woodies which are smooth as glass through the corners!

So why does Intamin use 4 wheel cars? Is it because of capacity? Because if it is, then why don't they use 4 wheel cars on their steel coasters as well? Or is it because they want to keep the "traditional" wooden coaster look? Or is there another reason behind this imo rather daft decision?
 

Snoo

The Legend
Length per car is probably why. Hell, even the PTC's use 4 wheels and those cars aren't that long.
 

Hixee

Flojector
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This might be a good read. It's not directly answering your question, but it briefly highlights some of the advantages (and disadvantages) of the different types of coaster trains:

http://capital2.capital.edu/admin-staff ... ercar.html

As for why El Toro has a four wheel set-up, well I don't really know. I may be making this up, or confusing my facts, but I thought that the chassis of El Toro (and the other Intamin woodies presumably) didn't quite use the fixed axle set-up like the more old fashioned woodies. I think each axle is able to rotate slightly (ie, it has a slight pivot movement) that means the trains can negotiate the turns without the wheel lifting issue as is mentioned in that article.

My only guess why they do this is because of the size of the trains. Each car is quite long and bulky, so it might not have been particularly easy to use the trailered design. They may well have compromised the flexibility of the train slightly by making the connections between cars simpler. I suspect it also gives them a bit of flexibility with maintenance as I think (from what I remember) each car is the same. With the trailered design the front and back cars have to be unique.

So yeah, UC would probably know better, but that's just an educated guess. :p
 

Ben

CF Legend
Take the question a bit differently...

Why do the Intamin woodies have long cars of three rows, as opposed to two on almost all other Intamin coasters?

The reason they have four sets of wheels I'd say is the cars are longer... So why are the cars longer? Why would a "normal" Intamin train not work on a Woodie? Or would it, and if so, why did they not want to use it? Cause, I have to say, it's noticeable in the turns...
 

andrus

Giga Poster
Thanks for the answeres! Although nobody really answered my question. I guess I might formulated the question wrong? I know that the reason to why Intamin use 4 wheels is the length of the cars (3 rows of passengers). My question is rather like Ben wrote; why do Intamin use the bulky 3 row (4 wheel) cars on their woodies instead of the agile 2 row (2 wheel) cars used on their steel coasters?


I actually have come up with a theory of this myself. It's not based around facts, and I actually still don't know why. It's just a theory I came up with!

Wood is a less strong material than steel. The framed structure more than makes up for that. But wood is a more soft material than steel so it might be that the wooden material can only handle a certain weight per wheel axis (even though the wear material is still in steel). It might be that wood can only cope with the weight of 3 persons per axis. That way the standard Intamin 2 wheel 4 passenger steel trains wouldn't work on a wooden coaster beacause the wheel axis pressure would be too high for the wood.

So Intamin decided to put double wheel axis (4 wheels) on the coaster cars. But if the wooden track can cope with 3 persons per axis, why not take the opportunity to add one row of passengers if they're going to use 4 wheel cars anyway? The 6 person car with 4 wheels would do just fine and the wood would cope with the pressure. That theory could be backed up with the fact that both Millenium Flyers and Timberliners, that have singel axis (2 wheel) cars only have 1 row (2 passengers) per car. So Intamin get enhanced capacity this way (compared to GCI and the Gravity Group).

I really don't know, but it kind of makes sense to me! Because what could otherwise be the reason to why Intamin conscious choose to use a type of train that's less good at handling corners than their standard train?? :?
 

Hixee

Flojector
Staff member
Administrator
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I've been thinking about why they have the 6-seater trains and, truth be told, I can't think of any logical reason. However, there is clearly logic in it as Intamin don't just do it for the hell of it. Just because I can't think of a reason doesn't mean there isn't one! :p

My ONLY thought is that it's something to do with the airtime. I remember reading somewhere a long time ago (again, my facts may have been distorted over time) that Magnum XL-200's 3rd rows have a higher level of ejector compared to a 4-seater train. I don't think I ever heard why, but it could be something to do with making the experience/forces better. I'd actually like to hear a reason for this. :D
 
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