Intamin Shares Concept Videos for New Coaster and Water Ride Attractions

This unusual summer is a perfect time for fans to do a little day dreaming about new rides that could come to their favorite park, and in this case via Intamin.  The famous attraction manufacturer has released four new videos of rides that they've cooked up.  Let's take a look.

Up first is the Ultra Splash, which looks similar to Mack's PowerSplash rides in concept.  Intamin's version uses a unique track design that is more of an I-beam than traditional track, and it supports itself all on one beefy looking base.

The ride follows similar motions to the PowerSplash, launching the high capacity boats up two vertical towers, back and forth until water fills the chamber below and the boat makes a giant splash.

The video notes that the ride offers a traveling track length of 1,722 feet, stands 121 feet tall and moves at a maximum speed of 58 miles per hour.

Up next is the Giga Splash, which uses a similar track and boat style as the Ultra Splash, but uses a vertical elevator to send boats down a giant, steep drop toward the pool below.

It looks like an updated version of the Intamin ride created for Holiday World (since removed) originally called Pilgrims Plunge.  The new version can start with a meandering ride channel before the elevator, which turns boats (that have stadium seating) 285 degrees for a nice view.

The boats head up 131 feet then drop down at 87 degrees at 62 miles per hour, over a huge air-time hill and then into a giant splash.

Here we have the LSM Vertical Coaster 47-280, a wild new compact coaster that Intamin says is the most compact triple launch coaster design in the world.

The ride features a forward, backward and forward launch to get the train heading up toward the top of the structure, at which point an extra launch boost takes place while riders are upside down.  At the crest the trains start a twisting downward "torpedo dive," soar near the station, then head up into a zig-zag loop.

The ride can handle either one trip around the track or two per cycle depending on the customer.

Lastly, Intamin released a new video for a single rail style coaster branded under the name Hot Racer.  The ride looks like Intamin's answer to Rocky Mountain Construction's single rail coasters.

They have come up with three example layouts, all of which are racing coasters with two separate tracks.  There is a small, medium and large example and the video details several new element types along with other popular ones we've seen on existing rides.

Busch Gardens Williamsburg has called on Intamin to build Pantheon

                                                                                 

                                                                     

    

BUSCH GARDENS REVEALS PLANS FOR NEW, RECORD-BREAKING ROLLER COASTER

Pantheon, Fastest Multi-launch Coaster in North America debuts in 2020 

WILLIAMSBURG, Virginia (July 30, 2019) – Today, Busch Gardens® Williamsburg announced exciting details about Pantheon®, a record-breaking multi-launch coaster set to open in 2020.  Featuring a total of four launches, this coaster located in the park’s Festa Italia village will reach a top speed of 72.5 mph, making it the fastest multi-launch coaster in North America.

The new Pantheon combines the might of five Roman gods in one record breaking display of strength, speed and power, including forward and backward launches, two inversions and a 95-degree drop.  The gods reinforce the theming of the new coaster and illustrate some of the thrilling elements for brave riders. 

“Pantheon is going to be non-stop action for riders.  We’ve designed it so that the experience is changing all the time and will keep riders wondering what’s next,” said Larry Giles, Senior Director, Design & Engineering. “Multiple launches, speed changes, a sharp drop and backwards acceleration are just a few of Pantheon’s one-of-a kind traits,” added Giles. 

  

The 2020 opening of this attraction will headline another exciting season at Busch Gardens Williamsburg, which has been named the “World’s Most Beautiful Theme Park” by the National Amusement Park Historical Association for 29 consecutive years and one of 2019 Best Amusement Parks by USA Today 10BEST.  From its thrilling roller coasters, world-class dining options and kid-friendly attractions, Busch Gardens offers fun for the whole family.

  

PANTHEON RIDE STATS

• TYPE OF RIDE:                   Multi-launch coaster (Fastest in North America)
• SPECIAL FEATURES:
• 95° drop
• Two inversions
• Four launches
• Launch 1 speed: 36 mph
• Launch 2 speed: 50 mph
• Launch 2 speed (backward): 61 mph
• Launch 3 speed: 67 mph
• TRACK LENGTH:                 3,328 feet
• MAXIMUM SPEED:              72.5 mph
• MAXIMUM HEIGHT:            180 feet
• RIDE DURATION:                Two minutes
• SEATS/TRAIN:                    Two trains, 20 riders per train
• LOCATION:                         Busch Gardens’ Festa Italia
• RIDE MANUFACTURER:      Intamin Worldwide
• RIDE OPEN DATE:              Spring, 2020

                                                                                                                          

                                                                             

Here are some construction photos from 9/14/2019

                          

Time to Burn? Check Out Intamin's New Website

© Intamin

On a slow news day, much like today, it's nice to share news of something that may not be news per se, but still quite interesting nonetheless.  Intamin has a new website, or at least one that's new to me.  I don't know exactly when it launched, but it's filled with great information and photos on many of their rides and attractions.

Intamin is celebrating their 50th anniversary right now, quite an accomplishment so many congratulations to them, and has updated their company profile to reflect the milestone.   That catalogue alone should fill up a bit of your time!

© Intamin

You can browse through each of their various ride types, from coasters to free falls and just about everything in between.  The company has highlighted many of their significant projects, and each one also has links to other documents such as ride spec sheets and more.  It's really a lot to look through, but a great way to learn more about one of everyone's favorite amusement ride manufacturers.

© Intamin

One other item to point out is Intamin's reference guide, which can be downloaded directly via this link.  It gives a list of all contracts the company has signed, by ride type and by year.  This document is a gold mine for fans of the company, showing statistics on all the fantastic rides they've created.  Plus there are specific ride type details as well, for example I did not know that SkyRush at Hersheypark is technically know by the company as a "Wing Coaster" with "Half-Wing-Train" designs.  Amusement park nerd alert!

Maybe even more interesting is the top of the reference list which shows rides not yet announced but that have contracts signed for.  Granted there are no hints as to where the rides will go, but it's fun to imagine where they will end up!

Happy browsing.

Unique Intamin Launched Coaster Blasts Off in China

© Intamin

Intamin has designed a brand new launched roller coaster for Hefei Wanda Cultural Tourism City, pictured above and located in China, that looks like a ride we all would want in our local park.  The coaster, who's name translates into Soaring With Dragon, is technically a complete circuit, though the use of a switch track allows the trains to have both forward and backward launches (up a vertical 197 foot spike) before taking on a giant non-inverting loop.

No only do the launches send the trains at a top speed of around 77 miles per hour, the coaster also features the tallest non-inverting loop on any coaster, at 187 feet - an element considerably taller than many coasters!

This video shows the coaster in action, along with many of its other elements:

After that huge non-inverting loop there is an inverted top hat element that turns the trains out toward the park's center lake.  The trains then zoom through several large helices, one wrapped around a large thematic element by the water.  The ride's actual track length is 3,437 feet, but due to the backward and forward launches the trains travel 4,192 before the experience is over.

Hopefully the success of this new coaster leads to other designs, and with any luck they will be a bit closer to home!  For more on the ride, including photos and other details, check out this article from Blooloop.

Energylandia to Build Europe's Tallest Mega Roller Coaster in 2018

If you're unfamiliar with Energylandia, well you're not alone - I saw news of the park building a massive roller coaster for 2018 but my first thought was, "what's Energylandia?!"  The park is the largest amusement park in Poland, and just opened in the middle of 2014.  It has expanded quickly, however, adding new rides each year, often multiple in one season.  The park already has 7 roller coasters open, with 3 (yes three) more opening in 2017.

But the park has already announced that they will build that tallest Mega roller coaster in Europe - designed by Intamin - for 2018.  The announcement came with this video, which shows off the ride in detail:

The new ride will stand 253 feet tall, feature a 266 foot, 85 degree first drop into a dark tunnel and a maximum speed of 87 miles per hour.  The layout includes plenty of air-time hills, a diving turn-around plunge along with several high-speed, low to the ground elements.  There's a twisted finale along with a water-splash to end the ride.

This certainly looks like another highlight to an ever-growing list of already announced 2018 roller coasters - it is shaping up to be quite a year for coaster fans!

Intamin's New Flying Aces Roller Coaster Now Open at Ferrari World Abu Dhabi

© Intamin Amusement Rides

Ferrari World Abu Dhabi has opened Intamin's latest Wing Coaster design, named Flying Aces.  The ride is themed to Italy's famous Count Francesco Baracca, who is credited with creating Ferrari's logo by painting the "prancing horse" on the side of his bi-plane.  The ride features the steepest cable lift hill (51 degrees) on any coaster and also the tallest non-inverting loop (170.5 feet), seen above.

Flying Aces features ride vehicles that are themed to a bi-plane, and utilizes a ride system and train design like those featured on Hersheypark's Skyrush.

Here is a point of view ride on Flying Aces:

Flying Aces' initial lift hill reaches around 207 feet in the air, and hits a top speed of nearly 75 miles per hour.  The track length is 4,920 feet and features a layout that includes many low-to-the-ground turns and ten moments of air-time.

Ferrari World released a nice making-of video that explains more of Flying Aces' theme and the construction process:

Flying Aces joins Ferrari World's other two roller coasters, a steel racing ride and also Formula Rossa, the world's fastest coaster.  Two additional coaster rides, the first SFX Coaster to open and an Intamin shuttle, will also come online at the park later this year.

Intamin Reveals New LSM Launched Zac Spin Coaster Design

Known for thrilling roller coaster experiences, Intamin has released details for an exciting modification to its existing Zac Spin design.  To make an even more thrilling ride in and equally small space, the company has added a LSM launch to the Zac Spin layout to amplify the excitement levels of riders.  This new version is also larger than the previous Zac Spin rides that have been installed around the globe.

© Intamin

Here is an overall view of the ride's layout.  The coaster's design is certainly similar to that of S&S's Free Spin rides, only containing a launch at the start.  Intamin's version will stand 105 feet tall and have 995 feet of track.  It is being designed to utilize three trains each seating eight riders - the trains are able to be built with the seats facing forward, backward and even inward facing one another.  The ride cycle time of 120 seconds and a moving platform in the station gives a theoretical hourly capacity of 720 passengers.

© Intamin

The ride actually sounds like it will use a launch at first out of the station and part way up the first hill at about 23 miles per hour.  Then a LMS lift will actually continue the car upward, when a final LMS boost will take the cars up over the top at 25 miles per hour.  The rest of the ride will use gravity with a top speed of over 30 miles per hour.  Because of the initial lift launch there will be no need for evacuation stairs or loud anti-rollbacks, as the cars would return to the launch area if they needed to.

Intamin just put out the press release covering the new ride, so no word yet on when or if we may see one open.

New Intamin Launch Coaster for Turkey's Vialand

Concept art of the new coaster

A brand new theme park that opened earlier this year in Turkey, named Vialand, is wrapping up construction of an impressive looking Intamin launch coaster.

The ride is listed as opening this October, but only referred to as LSM Coaster on the park's website, named for its launch system.

Coasters and More has a great gallery of shots of both the theme park and the new Intamin ride, taken when there were only a few pieces left to go up.  The ride starts with a launch down the cherry red track and into a large top hat - the end of which dips well below the grade of the launch track using the park's elevation changes.  From there the trains encounter a large air-time hill and then climb up into an Immelman.  A dive down below grade again brings a tight series of curves, then a steep climb into a heartline that reminds me of the one on Hersheypark's Storm Runner.  Looks good!

Vialand has an interesting selection of rides and attraction, including one of the King Kong themed Huss flat rides, seen above.  There is also a fun looking family coaster (another Intamin design) along with several water rides, two dark rides and some flats.

The Vialand theme park is located adjacent to a new indoor/outdoor shopping center, along with a performing arts center.  If successful I will be interested to see what other rides come on board in future years.

Intamin's New Website Full Of Goodies

Intamin Worldwide has launched a brand new website that is much like a late holiday present for all the coaster enthusiasts of the world. With sections for both amusement rides and transportation devices, there's plenty to look at.  It's also loaded with photos, videos, and .pdfs on all the different rides offered.

From those we can find all sorts of interesting things, like this schematic of Maverick at Cedar Point - heartline roll included!

The company also covers a new potentially record breaking 12 inversion coaster they've designed under the Multi Inversion Coaster section:

The coaster looks pretty wicked and packs a lot of inversions of various types into a fairly compact layout.  I have to imagine that some park would want to pick up one of these, if for no other reason than to have a record holder.  Odds are it'd be in Asia, though - that seems more likely than an North American park.

Anyway - happy exploring!

Fuga da Atlantide at Garadaland

Yet another reason to love YouTube - for years I've been highly curious about Fuga da Atlantide at Gardaland in Italy, and been hard pressed to find a good POV of the ride. Well not anymore!



The ride was so interesting to me because it was done by Intamin and called a "Super Splash" ride. To my knowledge, they've only ever done this one. I'd love to know why, because this looks like a fantastic replacement for those aging - and quickly being removed - Log Flumes of yesteryear.

The theming on this ride is really top notch, something that Gardaland does well on a regular basis. If you really want the best views click over to YouTube to watch in high quality.


Gardaland's official site has a really nice video as well of the attraction and some more photos. Anyone ever heard anything as to why no more of these ever popped up?

Intamin's Zac Spin Coasters

One of ride manufacturer Intamin's latest creations is the Zac Spin roller coaster, two of which opened this past summer.

I only paid some attention to these rides, but certainly took notice of their odd vertical-only shape and unique seating arrangements.

Each 8 person car holds 4 riders on either side of the track, and the car swings/rotates freely on its own as the ride progresses. It looks all sorts of fun.

The reason I'm writing this is because the ever excellent Lifthill.net has published an in depth look at these new rides. They have some drawings of other possible track layouts, and even an interview with Intamin.

Plus they have beautiful pictures as always. Check out the translated-into-English version here.