Scott And Carol Present: The Gravity Group Announcement

The Gravity Group is renowned for their unparalleled wooden coaster designs that have won numerous Golden Tickets awards. They have designed more wooden roller coasters than any other company in business if you include their designs from past years. Today they turn their attention to the design of the rolling stock for the next generation of wooden roller coaster technology. The new cars are called Timberliners.

“Timberliners incorporate new technology, such as magnetic braking and restraint monitoring, that weren’t even imagined when wooden coaster cars were first developed,“ according to Mike Graham, who was the lead engineer for the project. We have applied our expertise to sixteen different design criteria that addresses many criteria including maintenance, safety, rider comfort, and ride capacity.”

Some of the key features of the trains included:

• Single bench seating, for improved turning radius
• Shock absorption, for rider comfort
• New restraint design, for safety, security, and quicker loading/unloading times
• The new restraint design also provides the ability to monitor the restraints meeting ASTM F2291 Class 5 requirements.
• The new design also has the ability to incorporate magnetic braking, launch systems, and on board sound capability.

Kory Kiepert adds, “We evaluated fifteen different train configurations during this process. We started with a blank sheet of paper for this project. Timberliners are available for the 2009 season through a sister company, Gravitycraft.

Sorry for the lack of images, hopefully The Gravity Group glitch will get fix and we'll post them this evening.

Earlier today IAAPA inducted three new members into its Hall of Fame. The new members are Edgard Meeus, Arto Monaco, and Larry Cochran. Edgard Meeus was instrumental in the growth of Walibi World in Belgium. Arto Monaco was a principal in the founding of Santa’s Workshop in Wilmington, NY and the Land of Makebelieve in Upper Jay, NJ. They were both was inducted posthumously Larry Cochran has served the Six Flags corporation in various capacities and was able to receive his award in person.

Now it’s time to peruse the floor and find interesting people to talk to and take a few pictures of all the new attractions. We hope to have another update later today of what we’ve seen.