Please support the campaign against browser-specific Web site
design!
This Web page discusses the Construction Watch observations during August and September, 1997 for the new Mr. Freeze roller coaster being installed at Six Flags Over Texas.
As of August 1st, I've gotten a report that SFStL has been calling people to whom they'd sold Coaster Celebration tickets (with the explicit promise of ERT... extended ride time... on Mr. Freeze) to tell them that they won't be able to ride Mr. Freeze since it won't be open. And based on now numerous sources, Six Flags doesn't expect the ride to open until sometime this fall at the earliest, or else (and apparently, more likely) next year. There is an associated article in today's St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The St. Louis park has taken down their "Coming Soon: Mr. Freeze" signs and replaced them with signs saying "Thank you for your patience while we work hard to bring you Mr. Freeze."
Apparently Six Flags-St. Louis as consolation is going to give Coaster Celebration ticketholders access to the park on Friday as well as Saturday, and an extra hour of ERT on Batman on Saturday evening. (Of course, this is mostly of nearly no interest to those people who already have season tickets anyhow).
I'm getting lots and lots of E-mails suggesting that most or all of these supposed reasons for Mr. Freeze not yet opening just don't hold much water, and I have to admit I largely agree. Personally, I think that Six Flags ought to open the ride in a degraded mode and run it at the launch frequency they can feel comfortable with. Heck, SFOT has other rides (Chameleon, Dive Bomber, etc. etc.) which have very limited throughputs too, and they manage. There are a variety of approaches (reservation coupons, special tickets, etc.) to allow them to manage the demand, and to keep the lines to acceptable durations. Meanwhile, engineering work could be done during the hours when the park is closed (after all, that's when most of the testing has been done anyway) or during the weekdays in a month or so once the park drops back to a "weekends only" schedule. So why keep the ride closed?
My personal guess (and it's really just that) is that another part of the reason Six Flags might have for keeping the ride totally closed is to hold someone's feet to the fire... figuring that if the ride opens in a "temporarily" degraded mode, that could end up being one of those "temporary" things that would have a way of becoming "permanent". So whoever Six Flags is putting pressure on to fix the problems (and I suspect at this point they figure the 'villain' in the story is someone outside of Six Flags, perhaps Premier) is perhaps being told that "your delay is preventing us from opening the ride." Which would carry more weight than just "we don't think the throughput is what we'd hoped it would be," and the distinction might become a critical issue if Six Flags were to pursue litigation against whoever of the designer or builders they judge responsible for the delays.
There is at least one fascinating-but-discouraging report, however, that the effects of the overheating were more serious, resulting in LIMs actually cracking (I'm told this was discovered at the Texas park as a result of the high-launch-rate "certification" testing done immediately prior to the intended opening last week). That same report claims that there were no major remaining problems (at this point at least) with electrical supply voltage, but that we still shouldn't really expect to see the ride open until sometime in 1998.
In any case, we might even find ourselves here in Dallas being in the curious situation of next spring opening two major new rides, both Mr. Freeze that was supposed to open in 1997 and whatever's supposed to be opening for the 1998 season (and I'm still hearing lots of conflicting rumors swirling around about that, but the most credible ones seem to confirm my previous speculation about at least moving back the games building in Good Times Square and the creation of a "Gotham City" area (regardless of whatever they might actually decide to call it)).
I probably ought to point out that it's not fair to hold the park staffers who are blocking the entrances (and elsewhere in the park) culpable for the ride's delay in opening. It's not their fault, and they're usually not allowed to tell guests anything very specific about the reasons for the delay, even if they know the reasons themselves. Which they probably don't... Six Flags has seriously clamped down the security blackout curtains again, and most likely aren't even telling most of the park employees the true facts. Remember that you readers of this Web page probably know more about Mr. Freeze than most of them do. And you can bet that they, even as employees of Six Flags, feel helpless and frustrated with the delays too. So don't be too hard on them!
Meanwhile, the specially trained staffers who were supposed to be operating Mr. Freeze have been returned to their previous posts around the park. And even if Mr. Freeze does open this fall, remember that many of the staff who have been specially trained to operate the ride are going back to college the end of August, so the parks will have to train a mostly-new set of ride ops people when they finally do open it.
As of August 2nd, Six Flags has posted signs both in the ticket booth queue areas and in front of the loading building apologizing that Mr. Freeze is not open, and thanking guests for their patience. The crowd in the park, while not the heaviest I've seen, is still substantial here and doesn't seem to have the major dropoff that I've heard reported in St. Louis.
I will mention however that the situation I saw yesterday in the parking lot was among the most screwed-up messes I've seen there in a long time, with stop-and-go, bumper-to-bumper traffic all the way from the parking toll collection booths out to row 49 (where there were finally parking spaces, and this was just before noon on a Saturday). When I finally got there, I found out why things were such a mess... people were parking just ANYWHERE (not in an organized fill-distant-slot-first and then fill-to-the-drive, then start on the next row)... parking slots were being filled willy-nilly in several rows at once, and to make matters worse the trams were coming up way south of their normal route alongside the areas where people were parking (which could almost be good, IF the parking were otherwise organized right) but that created additional confusion among an already chaotic situation.
Anyone who has ever visited one of the Disney parks can't fail to be amazed by how incredibly efficiently Disney theme parks park their incoming cars. Disney uses a 2-deep diagonal pattern for one, where incoming cars simply swoop into the next available space (and filling from the far end of a row first, so cars start filling the next slot before they've even come to a stop in the previously filled one). By not using perpendicular parking spaces, cars don't have to jockey into position; by filling both positions in a long space with two consecutive cars they both just drive in and stop (almost without slowing down), and meanwhile the next two cars are parking in the next space closer to the main drive, and this continues until the entire row is filled at which point parking starts on the next row. Anyhow, the marvel of organization that Disney is so known for couldn't contrast more sharply with the chaos in the parking lots at SFOT on Saturday.
Instead of only just treating the parking lot as a cash cow, I wish that SFOT would take some of all those parking charges they collect and send someone to study Disney's parking lot techniques and then come back and put those lessons to work here. This would help visitors at SFOT get their fun day at the park off to a better start, rather than starting it right from the beginning in chaos and frustration.
As for Mr. Freeze, in the Daily Alert bulletin given to arriving park workers today it said:
"As you know, we have been working diligently to get Mr. Freeze open and we have experienced several delays. Six Flags has decided not to open Mr. Freeze this summer. While we still cannot give out a specific date of when the ride will be ready, we hope to open it by late fall.
"Due to the number of performance and technological issues with the ride, including its consistency of operation, we need additional time to work on the ride until it meets our stringent operating and performance standards. Until we are confident that Mr. Freeze delivers the speed and thrills it was designed to provide on a regular basis, we will not open the ride.
"Please communicate the following to our Guests when they inquire about the status of Mr. Freeze. First, please express our apologies for any inconvenience. 'Mr. Freeze will not open this summer because we are continuing to work on the ride to make sure it meets the park's high performance and operating standards.'"
That said, I'll just comment that "we are continuing to work on the ride" is not much in evidence in terms of seeing workers there and actually working on it. Unlike before, when they were really working on it and the area of Mr. Freeze was crawling with workers and the construction zone lots had dozens and dozens of cars and work trucks. At the moment, no such busy, concerted, and significant effort is at all in evidence. The daytime testing we saw a couple of weeks ago is totally stopped, and I've not been getting reports of seeing even nighttime testing. RideOps people have left Mr. Freeze to return back to their previous posts. The whole ride seems to have developed this ghost-ship feel about it. I know its themeing is supposed to be that of an "abandoned/derelict" ice-cream-plant, but Mr. Freeze seems just a little too 'abandoned' for my liking.
Even if not "necessary", if Six Flags would make sure that workers were there visibly doing something... even groundskeepers just planting shrubbery or flowers or something around the track area, perhaps... it would be easier to maintain the argument that "we're busily working on Mr. Freeze". While risking this becoming some kind of ongoing-forever-development (rather like SFOT's own sort of 'Winchester Mystery House'), at least this would help future riders feel that they really will enjoy a better and more marvelous (and not just 'older') experience when it finally does open.
Discouragingly however, instead of improving, the themeing and decor seems to be suffering (already!). For some curious reason, two tacky-looking chain-link fence "cages" (not at all in keeping with the original decor and design) have appeared just inside the entrance to the loading building.
And of course, there is somehow some kind of perverse irony in the fact that the heavily-hyped "Coolest Coaster On The Planet" is being kept closed apparently due to "overheating"-related problems.
As of August 3rd, I've received a copy of a newspaper article that appeared in The Asbury Park Press on Thursday, July 31st about the Chiller at Six Flags Great Adventure:
SIX FLAGS KEEPING CHILLER CLOSED
By ALLISON GARVEY, Toms River Bureau
Jackson Township - Batman and Robin: The Chiller, the new Six Flags Great Adventure roller coaster that closed shortly after it was unveiled, may remain closed for the rest of the season, park officials said yesterday.
"There are some inconsistencies with the acceleration systems that we want to address," said Deborah L. Israel, director of communications for the park. "We set the industry standards on this and we don't feel ready to roll if it's not going to roll right."
The ride is designed to launch passengers on two tracks from zero to about 65 mph in less than five seconds, turn them upside down, then right-side up, then around and up more than 20 stories in the air. It then forces them back down the same route backward.
To achieve the rapid launch and to propel the cars through the ride, the coaster uses linear induction motors, called LIMs, along the track to generate a magnetic wave that pulls the passenger cars. Other coasters at the park use the conventional chain lift and gravity to propel a car through the ride.
The LIMs, while not a new technology, are fairly new to the amusement ride industry. The ride closed in early June so crews could adjust the massive motors, but after they were adjusted the quality of the ride was still "a little rough," said park President Vincent Lupinacci.
The inability to reopen the ride has had an impact on park attendance, Lupinacci said. Good weather has brought attendance back to 1996 levels despite several rainy spring weekends but the numbers have not been as good as they would have been with a new roller coaster to draw visitors, he said.
"People are frustrated, we get a lot of coaster enthusiasts here and even though we've tabled a lot of our Chiller-oriented advertising because it wasn't running there are still people who come here that didn't know it was closed," said Israel, who said she and park officials are just as unhappy about the delay as are visitors to the park.
Israel said the ride could reopen toward the end of the season in the fall but it is more likely it won't reopen until the beginning of next season.
"The ride is not running up to performance standards and that is not what you want when you want to have something around for a long time," she said. "We hope to have this ride for 20 to 25 years and we want to get it right and do it right every time."
Crews have already modified the ride, improving padding on the bars that keep people in their seats and installing hand bars so it is easier to get into and out of the seats, she said.
The article then goes on to describe how the park is putting in Daredevil Dive (a skycoaster) to help satisfy guests' desire for thrills. Which of course is a pretty poor substitute for a major coaster like Chiller or Mr. Freeze!
I'll also comment that the ride being "a little rough" has no relationship whatsoever to any work the park did on the LIMs.
As of August 5th, there's still not a lot of news to report.
The earlier comments about how most of the readers of this site know more about Mr. Freeze than most Six Flags employees do is constantly being proven accurate.
The staffers guarding Mr. Freeze seem to be mostly newhires, perhaps even chosen for the position because they don't know much of anything about the ride. Some of the things inquiring guests are being told are quite outrageous... among them, that "the only drive chain is on the spike, to haul you up to the top," and the claim that nobody has ridden the ride (where I've talked with eyewitnesses who claim to have seen more than one trainload of decidedly human passengers riding it).
As of August 7th, still nothing really new to report. Clearly, whatever significant work is being done on Mr. Freeze is being done somewhere else, probably at one or more of Premier, Winkle Electric, or Force Engineering.
Lots of frustration all 'round. We were so close. Sigh.
As of August 17th, I've finally gotten some feedback from St. Louis following their "Coaster Celebration" last weekend. Here is some of the information, quoting directly from the report I received:
"At the afternoon BBQ the president of the park spoke about Mr. Freeze. He told us that only he and 3 other people have ridden in. He gave us a complete description of how the ride feels. (Just tease us!) He said that in the front seat, when you get shot up the spike, the track actually disappears from in front of you. He said it is quite scary. Someone asked whether or not the ride was as much of a headbanger as OLFOF. He said that is was quite smooth. (Of course, what is he going to say?) "
Then, continuing with a discussion about a tour of Mr. Freeze given to coaster celebrants later that evening: "They took us back in groups of 40 through the queue and up into the loading station. Elizabeth Gotway of the Communications Dept. gave the tour. She described the procedure for loading and unloading, although it was very difficult to hear her at times, so I missed a lot. The launch tunnel has sets of lights that chase. When sitting ready to lauch, they chase away from the train. Then, during the launch, they will chase toward the train to enhance the speed. They did not launch any trains for us during this time... It looks pretty neat... Hopefully we'll get to experience it this fall. "
I haven't seen any evidence of these chase lights in the tunnel here at the ride in Dallas... not down the length of the tunnel, anyhow... only just some white strobe lights in the first part of the tunnel that "sparkle" at the start of the launch, and some rows of yellowish lights right near the entrance to the launch tunnel which might "chase" (perhaps these are what the reporter was referring to... but in the Dallas version, based on what I've seen up to now, they only cover a very short part of the very beginning of the launch tunnel).
Otherwise, I've heard very little recently... again suggesting that whatever work is being done is being done somewhere else, well away from view. Probably at Winkle, Premier, and/or Force (or other subcontractors?). I'm hoping to start seeing and hearing signs of work on Mr. Freeze again, as soon as the revised subsystems arrive for installation. I fear, however, that at least some of the silence is due to the fact that a lot of formerly-excited people have just gotten disgusted and lost interest.
One frequent visitor to the park in Dallas reports: "...they tend to have the 'up to our standards' answer down pretty well, but that is hard to swallow when no visible sign of effort is being put forth to get it up to those standards."
Reports continue to circulate that the delays on getting Mr. Freeze working to Six Flags' satisfaction have derailed several other intended Premier LIM-launched coasters that were planned for other Six Flags parks. My own feelings on that, having worked in R&D environments, is that the seemingly-endless delays and pre-opening frustrations will largely be forgotten once the ride is opened, if it's as good in the end as it looks like it ought to be.
And the ongoing delays are now bringing back to the fore the whole series of issues about "what new ride will we get for 1998?", hoping that the to-be-finished Mr. Freeze won't be all there is. I still expect to see the games building shoved back, probably during the winter dark season, opening another new entire area to the park (the area I'd tentatively referred to earlier here as "Gotham City"... which certainly could be one place to at least temporarily reinstall the mothballed Spinnaker, which came out when Runaway Mountain was going in... (the one from here was actually moved to another Six Flags park, and the one which will be eventually reinstalled here... presently rusting silently in a backwater area off the distant parking lot... is a different unit than the one we previously had).
Other stuff the rumor mill say is being kicked around include a Superman ride, supposedly going over the current lagoon alongside the Judge Roy Scream, and an Intamin Giant Drop (a fun ride, though short... it does weird stuff to those of us with long beards ;-) ) which occupies a sufficiently small footprint that it could be placed over in the mostly-dead area at the southwest corner of the park, where that little Mexican market plaza is now. And of course there is still talk about gutting and redoing Looney Tunes Land, although one wonders how much that would really matter to the little kids it's designed for, who probably are already delighted with what's there.
Personally, while I like the big splashy major rides, I have to wonder if it wouldn't almost make more sense in terms of actual park visitor value to spend (instead of five to ten million dollars on one big spiffy ride, like Mr. Freeze) the same amount on maybe fifteen to twenty-five off-the-shelf carnival-type rides instead (but spruced up with better installation and landscaping). Perhaps opening a "Midway" section somewhere (maybe out where the Spring Breakout is or Fright Fest haunted houses are) celebrating the tacky but fun atmosphere of the traditional American county fair. This would add a lot of new rides all at once, and help diffuse the guests inside the park into a lot more separate (and thus shorter) ride queues.
Alternatively (or in addition) I've already mentioned that a major upgrade to the feel of the park could be done relatively cheaply by significantly upgrading all the cast member uniforms, especially including the currently pretty-cheesy-looking character costumes.
As of August 19th, I've run across another person who reports he personally saw (this was several weeks ago, sorry to report) a whole trainload (full!) of human riders launched on Mr. Freeze at the park in Texas. He says this was on a Saturday night, during testing, and it was about 10pm (probably nearer 11pm) and as the park was preparing to close. He asked the security people at the entrance to the station if he could ride too, but was told that they were just "testing".
While this is "old news", I'm reporting it here because it does substantially back up the other eyewitness reports I've received of people who claim to have seen complete trainloads full of human riders aboard Mr. Freeze during testing.
Otherwise, no news (good or bad) to report. I wish I could tell you otherwise.
Maybe, as I mentioned earlier this month, they're trying to give the station just enough of that truly "derelict/abandoned" feel...
As of August 23rd, I've gotten some great pictures of the interior of the Mr. Freeze station area. These were taken during the Coaster Celebration at the park in St. Louis, but one can presume that the Dallas station will be similar (but probably the mirror image of the one in St. Louis, as the rest of the ride is). I'd like to thank Patrick Lowery for sharing his pictures with us Mr. Freeze fans! He pointed out that the station (for the tour) was lit much more brightly than it will be during normal ride operation. He observed that there are long blacklight tubes underneath the track on each transfer cart, and in our own observations of the ride during testing here the boarding area positively glows with blacklights.
The above picture shows a train on the transfer cart, lined up with the launch tunnel and ready to be launched. The railing you see to the right of the train is connected to this train's transfer cart, the railing you see just to the right of it is connected to the other train's transfer cart, which is to the right just out of sight in the picture. Note the handgrips which have been added to the top of the back of the headrests, which were added to help make it easier for passengers to get in and out of their seats. The overhead door in front of the train to the right conceals the maintenance/storage track for that train. Note also the row of LIMs visible in the launch tunnel, running down from the end of the transfer cart's walkway. This picture also shows some of the lighting effects in the launch tunnel, which seem to be different than what we've seen (from the other end, though) in the launch tunnel here in Dallas.
The above picture is a little broader perspective and shows more of the transfer cart and shows a little of the left train's maintenance/storage track, visible through the partially-open overhead door to the left of the photograph. You also can see the operator's booth just above the launch tunnel.
Even more interesting, this picture shows three of the LIM modules on the transfer cart (there are three more on the other side of the track, under the walkway) and you can also get a nice view of the fins on the train, which run up to and through the slots on the LIMs. And more intriguing still are the pairs of cooling blowers, two per car per side (which seem to be centered at each car). Note that they are not concentrated on the LIMs, which are only on the forward end of the transfer cart... but on something which would seem to be below the fins and on each car. Presumably these blowers are designed to cool the mechanical brake units along the transfer cart, and/or the braking fins also on the train. Note also the panel visible towards the top left of this picture, which has some kind of curious markings on it.
This photo again shows the transfer cart and station area, but looking in the opposite direction (the yellow pattern is in line with and opposite the entrance of the launch tunnel). Again, note the pairs of cooling blowers centered on the position of each car of the train. You can also see the loading "chutes" along the exterior walkway towards the other side of the station, which helps confirm the previous report that one boards the trains from the outboard catwalks and leaves through the inboard catwalks (the ones on the transfer carts themselves)... which makes sense, because that allows the rideops to load the chutes in anticipation of the train arriving after the prior run and moving back into the boarding position. Itls also interesting to see how far down the over-shoulder restraints go! You can also see attached to them the additional black pads which provide additional padding to help avoid head-banging. Note that the other train seems to be on its storage track... it doesn't appear to be in place on the other transfer cart.
The above picture shows another detail of the frontmost car of one of the trains. You can see the LIMs, and (again) just a little of the cooling blowers. Note that the cooling blowers are not centered on the LIMs, but on something that is mounted below them. And this picture also shows the additional padding to prevent headbanging.
These two pictures show some of the overhead themeing elements in the station. Note the "icicles" seemingly clinging to the "coolant" pipes. The second of them shows a panel with some markings on it, I'm hoping that Patrick can clarify what these markings on this panel represent.
Apparently the final position of the animatronic Mr. Freeze hadn't yet been determined, although it would seem to make sense to perhaps put him in the "operator booth" (unless he'll be 'hiding' somewhere in the launch tunnel?)
The report is that the queue inside the station can handle perhaps one and a half or two hours of queue. Reportedly you enter at the side of the station, go down a hallway, make a few turns and then the line splits in two and you go up to the loading area. The St. Louis park says they don't anticipate anything like the five-hour queues that the Texas park (at least during the initial post-opening period) was rumored to be expecting. But perhaps that's more because the park attendance in general at the St. Louis park is usually lower than the attendance at the Texas park.
Patrick observed further that "As far as the trains go, I noticed that some of the fins appeared to be scraped and edges chipped. This is probably from them hitting the LIMs. ...I'm not sure if you can see it in the pictures, but there is a personal computer sitting on a chair in the operations area. I'm not sure what that is being used for." The PC is probably a remote console for use by the programmers while doing ride testing, to allow them to be closer to the trains and transfer carts during the testing procedures.
He continues: "Also, apparently there is a safety concern during the launch. I only caught some of what Elizabeth Gotway [public relations spokesperson for the St. Louis park] was saying about this. She said when Chiller was open in New Jersey, that it was hard to get the riders to understand that when the operators said "ready" that they had to be ready right then and there to go. I took this as meaning that the riders needed to be holding on and have their heads back in preparation for the launch. I can see where this could present a problem."
Patrick has (since taking these pictures) traveled to several other parks and ridden a number of other well-known coasters. About one of them, he reports "The biggest surprise of the trip was Outer Limits. This was my first time on this ride. Although it was a bit on the rough side, I still enjoyed it, especially the launch. It was sooooo intense. I can't imagine how Mr. Freeze is going to be since it will be faster. WOW!"
We're all chomping at the bit to experience the Mr. Freeze launch!
Patrick also mentioned that (up to now, at least) his favorite coaster is Magnum at Cedar Point.
Thanks again to Patrick for sharing his excellent photos with us!
As of August 25th, I've gotten answers to a few questions I had about the interior station photos recently posted. In particular, I was interested in finding out more about the curious panel mounted from the ceiling. I'm told it is apparently some kind of a map, with concentric circles and X-Y coordinates, showing "Gotham". There's also an LED display in the lower-right-hand corner, but so far I'm not sure what that displays.
Here at SFOT, it appears that work is under way to put back the long-missing track section of the Mini-Mine Train (removed to permit access by trucks and cranes to the Mr. Freeze construction site). Reports say that it appears that the section is being designed in such a way that it can be easily removed, perhaps on hinges, to allow easy access when necessary in the future for maintenance of Mr. Freeze.
So far, no dramatic new news about Mr. Freeze itself.
As of September 9th, I've heard a variety of fascinating (though overall discouraging) reports.
First, the good news... the Mini-Mine-Train is back in service. The missing track section has been replaced, and the ride is as good as it ever was. Which isn't saying a lot, of course... it's basically still a kiddie coaster, but one which adults at least can ride. The circuit is a pretty straightforward loop, with some mild hills but no crossovers or loops (HAH!) or anything else terribly dramatic. The main (only?) reason a coaster enthusiast will want to ride the Mini-Mine-Train is because it gives some terrific closeup views of Mr. Freeze... since the Mini-Mine-Train track goes right through Mr. Freeze's wraparound curve. You get absolutely terrific views of the spike, etc. etc., and once Mr. Freeze is actually running, this should be quite thrilling.
But the bad news is that Mr. Freeze (if the reports I've heard are to be believed, but they certainly seem credible) really will not be opening anytime soon. Certainly not in September, and almost certainly not in October either. In fact, we'll be doing real well to have it running in time for (the end of?) Holiday in the Park (the Thanksgiving-Christmas-New Year's holiday season).
The current problems keeping the ride closed reportedly are no longer due to overheating of LIMs or brakes (the blowers shown in the station pictures reportedly seem to have that under control)... are not due to the LIM technology or the drive electronics... are not due to Six Flags' in-house developed firmware... are not due to track problems... or most any of the other high-tech advanced things in the ride. The rumor says that the problem keeping the ride closed is a pure-and-simple mechanical problem involving metal fatigue and stress fractures and cracking in the housings of the LIMs, and the way they mount to the LIM support structure.
The rumor is that when the LIMs were removed last time from all three rides, stiffeners were added to the housings to keep the housings from mechanically flexing so much under the tremendous force exerted by the LIM coils and the aluminum fins running between them. (Not to mention the occasional-but-apparently-inevitable rude jolts caused sometimes when a fin runs into the housings or motor coil assemblies at 70mph!). And the stiffeners did their job, keeping those parts of the housings from flexing... but of course couldn't do anything to change or eliminate the forces at work, which then were concentrating on the areas of the housings where the stiffeners were not. This concentration of strong forces on a smaller amount of remaining metal started to result in metal fatigue and stress fractures at the remaining unstiffened parts of the housings.
So Six Flags was apparently faced with a devil's dilemma... should they open the much-anticipated rides, and hope that the stress fractures (which will increase over time with metal fatigue, caused by thermal heating/cooling cycles as well as purely mechanical flexing) would not become a problem before the end of the season, when the housings could be replaced with redesigned ones at leisure? Or should they take the safer and more conservative route, and keep the ride closed until they can be absolutely certain that the cracking problem is fixed once and for all? The choice, by this time, was obviously to take the safer, conservative route.
So despite the fact that no visible progress whatsoever has been taking place, there are reportedly a number of things that have been going on behind the scenes.
First, the firmware for the rides has reportedly been improved. Things that were probably initially done "quick-and-dirty" to try to meet the opening schedule have been revisited, cleaned up, and improved. The result will be smoother operation and more intelligence in the way the ride runs.
Second, a number of improvements have been made in the trains, as has mostly been already reported. Additional padding has been added to the over-the-shoulder collars to help protect the ears, handles have been added to help people get in and out of their seats without getting their hands pinched when the restraints on the seats in front of theirs are raised, to name just two.
Third, plans are reportedly underway to address the problems of airconditioning in the station and launch tunnel. The trains rushing in and out of the station work like a piston and displace a lot of air with each launch and return, and this combined with both the hot Texas sun and the heating load caused by the 2.4 million watts used to launch the trains results in a fearsome air conditioning problem. You might notice that in the pictures, there are no air conditioning units at all (yet?) on the roof of the launch tunnel.
Fourth and most importantly, there has apparently been a lot of discussion and work going on behind the scenes to reengineer new motor housings which will be able to take the beating they receive on a ride like Mr. Freeze. Rumors are saying, however, that there's not even a prototype of these new housings yet that everybody is totally happy with, let alone manufacturing close to nine hundred of them as will be needed to retrofit all three rides.
The rumor mill continues that even once the new housings are ready, all the LIMs will be coming down (again) off all three rides and will have to be remanufactured using the newly-designed and much stronger replacement housings... an operation which it is said will probably take two to three months all by itself.
And once the remanufactured LIMs are back at the parks with their new housings, they will of course have to be remounted to the support structures, realigned, reconnected electrically, and retested. And that operation doesn't take place overnight, either.
So that's the sad news from Lake Woebegone, fans. That's apparently why we're waiting, and that's why we're probably going to be waiting for at least two (barest minimum) or three months more before we have any serious prospects of seeing these rides running with us in them.
Disappointing? Of course. Could the timetable be sped up? Probably, somewhat... depending on who wants to throw more money at the problem. Just about everyone, however, already is probably chafing at the cost overruns and delays, and you can bet that nobody involved is eager to sink a lot of new money into the project if that can be avoided.
I'll be continuing to update the Web site, of course, as incoming news reports merit. But the recent less-frequent updates are probably to be the expected mode until visible progress starts becoming apparent again. (And thus I'll probably not break off August as a separate month, as I have for prior months, unless/until the page starts to get unwieldy again).
As of September 18th, the news doesn't really involve Mr. Freeze as much as it does the entire park! According to an article in yesterday's Arlington Star-Telegram, the management contract between Six Flags Theme Parks, Inc. and the actual owners of SFOT (Six Flags Over Texas Fund Ltd., according to the article a group of 224 investors which have owned the park since 1969) is up for renewal at the end of this year (the agreement ends Dec. 31st) and up to now they haven't been able to reach an agreement after something like six months of negotiations.
The article also goes into significant detail regarding who actually owns and who actually runs Six Flags Over Texas. Even Time-Warner owns only 49% of Six Flags Theme Parks, Inc, the rest being held by a company called "Boston Ventures", a venture-capital company.
Whatever the outcome, I don't expect that it will affect Mr. Freeze's opening. With the caveat that the themeing could change, since Mr. Freeze (and Batman in general) are Six Flags properties, and a split could result in the Batman stuff disappearing from the park (not a bad thing, but that's just my opinion) along with the Looney Tunes characters. Barring, I suppose, a separate license being arranged between D.C. Comics (and Warner Brothers) with the Texas park directly... I don't know whether Six Flags Theme Parks has exclusive rights to those names and characters.
My own take on the article is that an agreement will probably be worked out (perhaps the national chain will just buy the park from the current owners) but at the very least this current situation is interesting and could result in significant changes when the park reopens next spring. Go read the article!
As of September 19th, I've gotten a fascinating letter from a Georgia-based coaster fan which puts the item from yesterday into perspective. I've decided to copy it here in its entirety:
Note that Six Flags Over Georgia went through the same issues last year, and only came to a management agreement on December 30, 1996. Both SFOG & SFOT are built around a limited partnership owning the park (started with the Wynne family holding a majority percentage), and the Six Flags Corp. was the park management. This way the LP didn't have to get involved with the day-to-day operations of the park, but reaped the rewards of their investment.
SFOG's delay was based on the same issues that have come up to SFOT now. Interestingly enough, after the management contract was signed, on March 3, 1997, the day Batman opened, the LP here served a suit to SF Corp. over bad management decision and overcharges. (I've listed these before on the newsgroup and linked to the various AccessAtlanta.com stories.)
Bottom line is the partners don't feel they're getting the financial rewards due, SF Corp is overcharging expenses and playing with the books to show SFOG & SFOT are almost money-losing propositions (which we all know isn't true).
So there you have the letter, for whatever it's worth. Certainly an interesting take on the dispute.
As of September 22nd, there's still no visible signs of progress on Mr. Freeze. The LIMs are still in place (on the spike track at least) and the longer they stay there, the longer it's going to be before they can be remanufactured with new housings and reinstalled, so the ride can finally open.
There are also rumors about lawsuits, although with it presently not even being clear who is going to be running Six Flags Over Texas next year, it's not even obvious who the plaintiffs would be... let alone who would sue who, or which courts would have jurisdiction. And of course, the fact remains that Six Flags has (and will have) a number of major Premier rides, at least three of them involving LIMs... so it's not in Six Flags' long-term interest to put out of business the sole source suppliers of spare/replacement parts to keep those rides running.
There are also persistent rumors that some or all of the small lake next to Judge Roy Scream is (sadly) going to be filled in, so SFOT can use the space for another major ride (the most persistent of the whisperings I hear says "Superman", although personally I think it's a curious choice to have both Superman and Mr. Freeze in the same park). Certainly Superman's linear shape and size conform to approximately the size and shape of that lake... it would run out parallel to the Judge Roy Scream, with the tower towards the south end of the lake (hopefully some of the lake, at least, can be retained).
One tipoff, perhaps, that this is more than just a rumor: the two large trees on either side of the Bill Cobb Memorial Plaque (seen from the queue for the Judge Roy Scream), at the north end of the lake, have been cut down.
Other fairly recurrent rumors suggest that another new ride in SFOT's future is a Giant-Drop type ride, and with that ride's small footprint it could be installed almost anywhere in the park. Personally, I think it would be appropriate to put it where the little Mexican plaza is, just to the left of the entrance; that area is rather dead and generally very underutilized at the moment. It would help encourage some entering guests to go towards the left, rather than to the right (where most of the best stuff is now).
Of course, if all of these become real, then that would suggest that the current G-Force (a first-generation Intamin freefall ride) would be redundant, and might come down... after all, do we really need four freefall-type rides? (G-Force, Mr. Freeze, Superman, Giant Drop)? So that would free up a piece of land at a fairly prominent location inside the park.
If the park management does change for next year (which seems unlikely), then it's possible that we'll (eventually, at least) see some dramatic changes... certainly some of the Time-Warner/Six Flags themeing would go away (most of that is pretty superficial anyway, with the main exception of the Bugs Bunny/Yosemite Sam river adventure ride), but also we might finally get some of the detail improvements that make Disney parks so exceptional: world-class cast member uniforms, Disney-grade character costumes, and generally a higher standard of detailing throughout the park.
As of September 25th, the rumor mill is saying that movement is accelerating to a very brisk pace (although still very much behind the scenes) regarding the work needed to fix the technical problems still keeping Mr. Freeze closed.
The word I hear is also that Six Flags has decided to conduct most of the following testing in St. Louis rather than Dallas. Mr. Freeze in St. Louis is on an island in the middle of the river rapids ride, surrounded by the park, and the park there will close for the season significantly before the Dallas park does. Mr. Freeze in Dallas, on the other hand, is on an outside corner of the park and readily observable from outside by passersby. Apparently, Six Flags is still trying desperately to shroud their activities and keep everything secret for some inexplicable (and probably unwise, in the end) reason.
Despite the now-accelerated pace of work, I am beginning to think it very unlikely by this point that Mr. Freeze will open before next spring.
As of September 27th, nothing really new to report. More talk and rumors of a new Superman-type ride to be built next to Judge Roy Scream (perhaps for 1998), more reports of rumblings about possible lawsuits over the delays of Mr. Freeze.
As of September 30th, there's little concrete news of any change at SFOT. Given the ongoing major uncertainties about the park's management team for next year, perhaps this is not surprising.
In St. Louis, the rumor is that the planned major renovations of Looney Tunes Land and the childrens' boat ride there (both had progressed to artist's conceptions at least) have suddenly been shelved. Even rumors of a major new ride for 1998 (with most of those rumors seeming to center on a Giant Drop) seem to have dried up, too. Speculation there in St. Louis is that the change is to keep cash available to devote to fixing the problems with Mr. Freeze.
Use the BACK control on your Web browser, or click here to return to my main home page.
Please support the campaign against browser-specific Web site
design!
Artist conception images and drawings are copyright Six Flags Theme Parks, Inc. (C) 1997, Mr. Freeze and related elements are property of DC Comics, (C) 1997. Photographs of Mr. Freeze LIMs are (C) 1997 Winkle Electric, used by permission. Article from The Asbury Park Press (C) 1997 by The Asbury Park Press. .AVI files digitized by Jim Everman of St. Louis, original Channel 2 news report (C) 1997 KTVI-TV, St. Louis. Photographs of Mr. Freeze station interiors (C) 1997 Patrick Lowery, used by permission. The rest of this page (including my own original photographs) and all linked contents originating with me are Copyright (C) 1997 by Gordon E. Peterson II, all rights reserved worldwide. Last revised October 5, 1997.