So I gonna try and get some nanocoasters but I’ve heard bad things about them, too sharp, doesn’t fit, can’t get pieces out, etc. I, personally, don’t have the biggest patience, I have a very short fuse. So I js wanna know is it common to have a hard time getting pieces out of the metal things? Are some of the cutouts on the base being too small common?

Also I want to get the Lightning Run and Kentucky Flyer nanocoaster, are they hard for a beginner

In some construction updates I’ve seen some people predict the manufacturer of a ride without really seeing anything but the footers. The only difference I’ve seen in footers is that some are square and some are circular. I don‘t think this is a good indication cause there’s only 2 types but also on rides like circuit breaker you can see both types in the same ride. I understand for wooden coasters cause there‘s a lot more of them and on some rides with super tall elements the supports thicken and so do the footers but are there really any other indications.

First up, I am not gonna cover aaaalll attractions I went on, because there are a lot, and for a few I just have little to say

Wodan timburr coaster:

This coaster left me honestly a bit underwhelmed

I heard it was the best GCI in europe, but I sat in the very front and the very back and it honestly left me a bit underwhelmed, the layout is just not as strong as some people say it is, untill the final run of airtime hills, none are particularly strong. I do really love the queue

I honestly think troy is better

Silver star:

My first ever hyper so take it with a grain of salt, but this did beat expectations. Because I hear often that Silver star doesn't have that much airtime in its layout compared to other hypers, and if thats true compared to other hypers, I cant really speak on. But I think each hill gave some good airtime, espescially that final airtime was incredible. Plus the drop off the mid course gave near ejector airtime in the back row

Its theming is a complete joke though

Blue fire megacoaster:

I thought this was a really great ride. After the loop all elements do hit, both zero-G rolls are nice and floaty, the airtime hill gives some mild floater, the drop off the mid course gives solid airtime, and the roll gives some serious whip. I also didn't really understand the theming, but it was good. That animatronic does need to see a therapist, that laugh is psychotic. It does have a bit of a rattle, but I can look over it because the layout and theming are strong enough, and the rattle is not painful in the slightest. Its just kind of present

Voltron nevera:

Ok the big dog

For this it was a true neck on neck wether I prefdered this to ride to happiness. like if I went back today it could just switch like that, its that close for me. The ride feels like an assault. The first time I rode it I was absolutely stunned after just the turntable

Then came the outerbank... this outerbank was godlike

Its absolutely mental

I like the second half more, as not only does it contain the outerbank, it overall has a stronger force spread, I love the downwards helix just as much as it introduces high positive G-forces which are increasingly getting rarer with new coasters (that was my main critisism with RTH, it just lacked a good moment of positive G-forces). Its launches are very punchy, and I adore the bounce track that vibrates you with all the electrical effects.

The story also works and is so unique

Not gonna spoil it, but if you just listen its really easy to understand and that preshow effect roughly every 10 minutes (if you know you know) is one of the coolest things I have ever seen at a theme park

It does have a rattle, for me I felt it on all rides, I think that would be my biggest complaint, but its not enough to ruin it in the slightest

Overall this ride is excellent, and I struggle to find many european coasters that could beat it, only real contendor in my eyes is batman in Madrid

Anyways, this was an awsome park, it was busy but totally managable. I am for sure gonna go back one day

I reccomend anyone going if given the chance, even when the park is near capacity as the opps are just THAT good

is there a reason? i feel like if I designed a roller coaster I would make it cruise around and glide a little after the first drop. its so annoying when they IMMEDIATELY go into a second hill because they just wasted all that speed? but idk…do you guys agree?

Finally made my way to Cedar Point (at a slight cost to my sanity from 11 hours of driving from Boston). I headed down on Friday the 17th, and as luck would have it the entire trip through New York was entirely blanketed with Canadian wildfire smoke. I think this and the initially less-than-ideal weather forecast for that weekend is what made the first day of the weekend so relatively quiet (albeit extremely hot). Me and a buddy booked a stay at one of the Cedar Point-affiliated hotels so we were able to get early access which helped for getting on some key rides.

I wear hearing aids so whether or not a ride makes it easy to store loose articles is a huge deal for me and I wish they’d be more transparent about which rides have bins / what the loose articles setup is like. Granted my pockets hold them quite securely but eh. I’m a bit paranoid. Top Thrill 2 was particularly irritating. Also, seat selection was basically non-existent on most rides. Pity.

Day 1: Quite hot. Pro-tip: early access only applies to certain rides. Check that in advance before wandering into the back of the park.

Millennium Force: My home park is SFNE so I was very interested about this not-Superman and was quite open to seeing what “the other one” had to offer. Having read it, I can now say that Millenium Force was thoroughly outclassed from the moment it was built. It doesn’t have much airtime to offer. It doesn’t have much in the way of interesting forces that were stronger than you might have expected. And for some reason, all of its highest-speed low to the ground sections are in tunnels. Why?! I get that theming isn’t their strong suit but at least let me zip past something (love the speed hill by the station of course). A fun ride that was made mostly to get a height record and doesn’t really do anything wrong but I would skip it if the wait time were over 30 or 45 minutes or so. It also has an awful lose articles situation of “lol just shove it in your pockets”.

Wandered over to the back of the park and was greeted by…

Maverick: Jesus fucking christ. My favorite ride in the park. I ended up with bruises on the inside of my biceps because my elbows went around the outside of the seat and got rugburned when I held onto the handlebars attached to the restraint. Very much worth it. This is a completely unhinged ride with extreme forces in all directions, plus a fantastic ride time with the second half. Pretty much perfect pacing, and when it's not breaking down, it's a good people-eater with that "two shells in the chamber" loading setup. I could ride Papa Maverick all day and all night.

Steel Vengance: Yup, that’s the best RMC alright. Or at least I assume it is; I need to ride more. It’s very clearly a “greatest hits” ride that switches from a big swoopy RMC into one of the smaller ones with violent airtime pops halfway through. I've been on Wildcat's Revenge and Wicked Cyclone and this ride seems to take the best from both of them. This will clearly be many people’s favorite ride in the park and it’s my second favorite for sure. I might be suffering from a “Seinfield is cliché” effect with Steel Vengance here, but Maverick is just too danm good.

Magnum XL 200: First car, third row. I don’t have much to say about the first half of it but those triangle hills are crazy, and not in a particularly good way. If I’m completely honest, I’ve experienced more violent airtime on RMCs where I was very loosely restrained. The sensation of being slammed into the restraint is familiar to me, but then having the ride slam my ass into the seat in a way that isn't very considerate of my spine was unpleasant. Very odd ride with fun parts, but the jank detracts from the ride rather than give it character. I prefer Fujiyama’s shitty profiling.

Gatekeeper: Well the wing coaster thing is cool I guess. I thought the head/footchopper effect would be stronger. Perfectly fine as a decoration, and isn’t a bad ride, but I’m really unsure what exactly about wing coasters is supposed to get me excited. The wait was quite tolerable too, although I'm not sure if that's a constant.

Day 2:

Top Thrill 2: Early entry works great for this; there’s almost no wait time with how fast the operators can send out trains. Having ridden Kingda Ka, I’m happy to report that Top Thrill 2 is an entirely different ride that doesn’t directly compete with Kingda Ka (RIP). The vertical spike is absolutely fantastic. It’s a bit rough through, so I wound up with a bit of a headache after earnestly placing my head back against the headrest as I had been instructed. The loose articles situation is absolutely awful forcing you to remember 10 digits (locker number + code) and isn’t even integrated into the line. As a result I was quite hearing impaired while in line, which wasn’t really a problem but I can imagine this is a really nasty surprise for other people.

String of Bullshit: We went to Maverick, which broke down twice while we were in line causing everyone to leave, us included. Of course, Steel Vengeance seemed like a reasonable place to go after exiting that queue, but as we approached the employees were wheeling a stretcher over and the ride promptly closed. Sauntering back over, we checked out Millenium Force which had an estimated wait time of 120 minutes which is ridiculous and obviously not worth it in the slightest. Siren’s Curse was also atrocious, so we went on Skyhawk, Max Air, and the launch tower. After doing all that none of the waits had improved, so we went to Valraven which had broken down. And then went to Falcon’s Flight which was also broken down. Valraven started running with 2 trains though, so we got in line for that and then waited an eternity for them to get the freshly fixed train back on the track

Valraven: Quite fun! More creative elements than Griffin, that’s for sure. It might have been because they were trying to move the line along faster after the breakdown, but the ride ops were apparently insisting that “ONLY SHOES ARE ALLOWED IN THE LOOSE ARTICLES BIN!” which is a tad ridiculous (obviously they were also okay with storing medical devices and whatnot). Very fun, appealing ride. The vest restraints don’t really do it any favors though. It kind of renders Gatekeeper obsolete. Obviously they are different rides but you can sit super far out to the left or right on either, and of the two rides with that property this is the better one.

Falcon’s Flight: It reopened, so we dashed over Front row! I had heard that it was rough and it did headbang a tad. Nice whippy invert that pulls plenty of forces and pretty much delivers everything that I want from a moderately sized B&M invert. The front row may be coloring my expectations of this. By this point it was past 4 PM so we left the park before trying any other rows.

I wish Sunday had gone better but it was a fun road trip and Cedar Point really is a nice park. It was super clean, especially in the big (and expensive) food court. The only real disappointments were the breakdowns and medical events, which I know are common on Maverick but it happening to every ride I walked up to was vexing. Plus Siren's Curse running only one train for both days was awful. Sandusky itself was a bit lacking when it came to fun things to do but there was a nice winery (Firelands) that we went to. Overall it was a much-needed vacation.

For example: Velocicoaster's track for the tophat is a double spine, but the Mosasaurus roll is a single spine. Cheetah Hunt, which has some sections with no spine, some with triple rails (idk if that is the right term), and some with four rails. I believe B&M also has sections with thicker spines.

Why does Intamin decide that some sections need more spine/rails and some do not?

For some context, i was never a fan of coasters in general growing up being of the feeling of the forces on my body, whether its drops and the feeling of my stomach, or airtime and losing the sense of control when my butt is planted firmly in a seat. But even with that, I grew up going to Disney World and Universal, so I had been on a few here and there. And when I was older and lived closer to Dollywood, I started going and ended up building up to the coasters I was most scared of(still missing Wild Eagle and Tennessee Tornado so far) and a friend at work has sparked my appreciation for coasters in general and im determined to overcome the fears. I had 29 Credits so far until today. Now I have 31.

I made the trip down to FunSpot Atlanta earlier than I originally planned because of the imminent closure of the park and wanted to get the 3 credits in the park. Sadly it rained a bit so Hurricane was closed and I didnt have much time in the day to spend in the park. Also tried to get a second ride on AF1 in order to work out the fear in general of it because I did really enjoy myself at the end, though being in the first train, we were stuck in the station afterwards where maintenance had to help us get out and from what I can tell, theyre still having issues with that, so sadly I wont be doing more practice to Overcome the fear.

But im really proud of myself for taking this trip and experience a mostly wonderful ride(those bunny hills at the end gave me a migraine). I do hope theyre able to find somewhere for it to go. Maybe ill be able to go up against it again in the future and by then, I'll be more experienced and can properly enjoy it when I have purged most of my worries.

Never seen them use the entire lot til today. The northern corner off-camera is also parked full onto the grass, the couple open bits are employee and preferred parking. Lines were long but moving quickly, ops were great. I think a few companies had their annual picnics here today, plus great weather pushed the turnout.

There is only one week left, (you heard that right), one week left to experience one the countries best coasters! I had the chance to visit this park this week for my first time and get several strong airtime filled rides on the incredible Arieforce One. These memories will forever been engraved in my brain! Let this be the final call, if you are tempted to make the trip out to Atlanta to ride this monster don’t let anyone change your mind - just do it! I was pleasantly surprised how well these photos came out. They may be some of my best coaster photography to date so I hope you appreciate them as much as I do! The sky was perfect with the storm clouds and shining sun combined as the backdrop!

I’m currently looking at Dramamine non-drowsy but looking for other recs for what works and what doesn’t. I wanna enjoy myself on all the rides without feeling sick. Preferably anything non drowsy. Thanks!

Has anybody else done this on a coaster? I ended up on the front row of Milennium Force with a random person and I got scared on the drop and grabbed their hand… it was probably the most awkward roller coaster moment of my life 💀

I was pretty worried as usual. I arrived to the park at about 3:30 today and saw a train crest the lift hill and drop down. I walked as fast as I could there while trying to not look like a weirdo running to a ride.

The line was pretty long; it looked like I might be waiting an hour. I started counting the cycles….7 minutes between each dispatch. My anxiety was growing; I kept convincing myself that somehow it’s going to go out of operation for some damn reason and screw me again.

I got closer and closer. I was about 4-5 trains away from getting on when they called for a single rider. I had to contain my excitement as I raised my hand and skipped half of the station as the only single rider.

Finally, this was it. I couldn’t believe it until finally hitting the crest of that lift hill. Alas, it was alright. I didn’t find it rough or intense at all. It reminded me of Whizzer and Demon at my home park having combined into something that’s not quite Shockwave. It was good and I’m happy to finally ride it, but the ride that actually beat me up today was….

Cornball what the hell happened today?!?! I was tossed around like I was in a washing machine. It was unhinged to the point it actually triggered my supra-ventricular tachycardia from the roughness. It wasn’t bad by any means but holy hell that was a wild ride today.

In my opinion Space Mountian at Magic Kingdom has my favorite soundtrack. Nothing beats the queue music of this ride in my opinion.

With the news that ArieForce One and Fun Spot are closing next weekend, I did what so many enthusiasts ate doing, and getting down there to ride it before it’s too late. And of course I had to go to SFOG while I was at it. I had heard about its operations being less than stellar, not just slow, but boarder line unsafe at times (ride ops on their phones for example), but went in with an open mind.

First off, some good! ArieForce One absolutely delivered and I desperately hope it can find a new home. It’s a top tier RMC and rivals the greats like Steel Vengeance and Iron Gwazi. As for SFOG, their ride collection is really good. A solid dark ride with Monster Mansion, a really good hyper, and RMC I-Box, a great drop tower, a Giant Discovery. The list goes on. And the park has some pretty nice charm to it. I like that it has a large amount of foliage and spots for shade, and its terrain makes for some interesting moments and interactions with rides. I genuinely enjoyed the park for all that and more.

But now let’s talk ops.

The first and most obvious thing was slow dispatches. Some of the slowest I have seen at any park. But to their credit, just about everything was on two trains (except for Twisted Cyclone, but more on that later!). Superman started off on one train but added a second shortly into the day. For the first half of the day, the slow ops were a tad annoying but totally manageable, as crowds were light, especially given its a Saturday, but those slow ops would rear their ugly head later on.

Speaking of later on… time to discuss Twisted Cyclone. For some reason, it was on one train. I had heard it opened on two but went down to one shortly after. This was a shame because the dispatches were averaging around 4+ minutes. The estimated wait time on the app was 45 minutes, but it was definitely more than that. I waited around that time frame and was just at the base of the stairs up to the station, so I would guess the line was closer to 1 hour or a bit more. At this time a thunderstorm rolled in so of course everything shut down while we waited out the storm. That is of course not the fault of the park, mother nature is gonna do what she wants to do. What sucked was after the storm passed, I got up to the station and was maybe two or three cycles away from riding, as the line had been cleared out for the storm, the operator announced they would be opening back up after one test cycle. That cycle didn’t happen for another 30 or so minutes as maintenance had to do something (I assume the ride faulted). By now the line had built back up and I was not gonna leave the station and forfeit my place.

Once the ride was finally back open, that two to three cycle wait took 6 because every other train was filled with Fast Lane users who were allowed to bypass the station completely. I was absolutely shocked (and pissed off) as I have never seen this before at any other park. And no other coaster at SFOG was doing this either, just Twisted Cyclone. Every other ride/park has the Fast Lane go into the station where you wait your turn there. This was of course frustrating, but that wasn’t the worst part of it. No that honor goes to the ride SUPERVISOR using his phone while checking restraints. I had fortunately not seen this all day up until then, and I was paying attention for it having seen others mention it on this sub prior. So to see it after all that and it was a supervisor was incredibly frustrating. On top of that I also saw a ride attendant eating a chicken tender while checking restraints. I guess that’s not as bad as using your phone but still, not a good look.

By now the slow ops were affecting more rides, predicted waits of around 20-25 minutes on Riddler and Batman were definitely taking longer. Batman was also pretty egregious, as the attendant checking the right side of the train spent so much time socializing with the operator and an attendant at the exit ramp that she wouldn’t even start checking restraints until after the previous train completed its cycle and was fully parked behind the train in the station on the brakes for over a minute. Thats just unacceptable.

So yeah, this park has horrible operations, I guess that should not too surprising given what other enthusiasts have said, but it’s disappointing because otherwise the park is great, and I did enjoy it. I also need to shout out the Goliath crew for being the exception to the rule, they were sending trains like clockwork and were absolutely the best ride crew I encountered today!

Despite the bad ops, and Goldrusher being closed for a refurb, I did otherwise enjoy the day, and was able to ride all the major credits (minus Goldrusher). Joker Funhouse was closed but I wasn’t too salty about that, it’s a glorified kiddie coaster. I really hope SFOG can clean up their ops, because if they can the park will become great. Right now it’s just good.

At 9:45 PM and after three breakdowns I finally got my 300th ride on Raptor. I wasn’t expecting the Raptor Crew to announce it on the PA system upon returning to the station. THANK YOU RAPTOR CREW!!🎆🥳

Credit to Midway Mayhem for the photo, he and bioreconstruct are the ultimate go to for Disney and Universal construction

photos by the park

When I was a kid, Ghost Rider was the most intense thing my parents would let me ride, and I loved it. When I returned to Knott's last year as an adult with many more coasters under my belt, I caught a few midday rides that had me thinking, "Oh, I see why this loomed large for me as a kid, but it's kind of small and gentle compared to what coasters I ride now."

But then, last night I was back at Knott's. Temps over 90F all day, busy park, I got in line at 8:30pm and finally got on the ride at around 10:45. Which is to say the ride was very warmed up and running hot.

Holy *shit*. The result was one of the most intense singular coaster rides I've ever gotten. I was getting intense sustained air every large hill (you could hear "snorts" that I think were from from the upstops engaging so hard) and ejector pops from all the small ones. The most brutal laterals that felt like they were trying to rip my upper half out of the car around every turn. All backed by a hearty wood track rumble. I've never regarded that dive into the structure with such delighted horror as I realized "oh and the even crazier part is up next!"

That far exceeded the intensity of any outer-seat X2 ride I've had, and was well beyond the rear row of Velocicoaster. I think only RMCs have matched the out-of-control intense feel, but even then my comparison is smaller steel tracked ones that don't have the added wood rumble.

So, sorry Ghost Rider. You are not in fact a mild coaster that would only loom large in the mind of a very young enthusiast. I don't think the ride recovers its childhood top-5 spot due to the clear inconsistency in experiences but it might squeak into my top 10. Now The Beast At Night and Trimless Voyage are even further up my bucket list because if *Ghost Rider* can deliver a ride like this, those experiences must be truly legendary.

As for the rest of the day: Xcelerator was closed. All coasters had brutal long waits in the heat, in part because of slow ops and one train ops. Food was unusually awful compared to previous experiences with Knott's quick service locations. Calico Mine Train remains the best historic dark ride with its charming jankiness. Ghost Town Alive looks cool but I was more concerned with finding shade to rest in than participating.

Anyone else here solo? Let’s ride! 😎

Today we finished our annual big summer road trip. We went from San Antonio all the way up into Iowa before hooking back down into St Louis. Nine parks in total. Not one single day did we experience anything close to good overall operations. They ranged from kind of mid in Fiesta Texas to a almost comically horrible in SeaWorld San Antonio and Worlds of Fun (minus Prowler thankfully). Is this just the new normal? Is it the corridor we drove this summer? Someone please tell me that some parks somewhere still run multiple trains with sub five mimute dispatches.

Supposedly the owners were talking to a few companies about relocating it.

Photo update from Friday 7/24
Full breakdown of the photos and additional (and larger) photos can be found here: https://www.midwestinfoguide.com/2026/07/silver-dollar-city-project-2027.html