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Powder Keg Test Run Photos! Check 'em out!


robbalvey

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Hey everyone!

 

The nice people over at Silver Dollar City have just emailed me some pics of the ride testing! Below is their most recent press release along with the photos!

 

I for one am very interested in this ride since it's the first ride to show off the 'marriage' of S&S and Arrow technology.

 

--Robb

 

Silver Dollar City Adds New

$10 Million, Environmentally-Designed,

Explosive-Launch Roller Coaster

 

Powder Keg Blasts Riders 0-53 mph in 2.8 Seconds

 

 

(Branson, Mo. 2/05) The Silver Dollar City theme park in Branson, Missouri is presenting an all-new super launch coaster for Spring 2005 that shoots riders into a thrill zone within seconds of climbing aboard, launching them from 0 to 53 miles per hour in just 2.8 seconds. Constructed within the forests of the Ozark Mountains and winding down a hillside, Powder Keg is a family thrill ride unlike any other in the history of the park. It combines launching speed with spiraling turns, negative gravitational or “G” forces, and “floater” hills to create a thrill ride of great magnitude.

 

In addition, it’s packaged in an environmentally sound design.

“An air launch system like this is amazing - there is great launching speed yet virtually no impact on the environment,” said Stan Checketts, founder and CEO of Powder Keg manufacturer S&S Power of Logan, Utah. S&S is the world’s leading manufacturer of compressed-air rides and the largest ride manufacturer in the United States.

 

Checketts said Powder Keg is one of only three like it in the world that uses clean compressed air technology for incredibly fast and energy-efficient acceleration. "Unlike traditional mechanical or hydraulic systems, this technique runs cleanly, and the ride runs smoothly while soaring through the trees at speeds up to 64 miles per hour.”

 

A $10 million project, Powder Keg takes riders from the initial big blast up a lift to a 110-foot drop, into spiraling and dragonfly banked turns, through a wave of floater hills with negative G forces, giving riders the experience of weightlessness above the trees. As required by Silver Dollar City policy, only those trees that had to be removed were, with three additional trees planted elsewhere for every one removed.

 

Themed in the Real History of the Ozarks

In keeping with Silver Dollar City’s internationally-awarded commitment to bringing the colorful history of regions to life, Powder Keg salutes the miners who worked in the great Marvel Cave, which is located below the theme park. In the late 1880s, tons of nitrogen-rich bat guano were hauled out of the cave’s massive sinkhole using an archaic pulley system. The guano was taken by stagecoach and railroads to powder mills across the state and the country where it was used to make valuable black powder.

 

“The Powder Keg ride begins in a powder mill amid barrels of nitro-explosives that rock and tip,” said Brad Thomas, general manager of Silver Dollar City. “As the nitro ‘explodes,’ the cars blast out of the building with special effects of fire and smoke shooting through the roof!” While the ride offers thrills, it has been designed to accommodate families. Anyone over 42 inches in height can ride, which is roughly a five or six-year-old, said Thomas, who cites guest surveys that resoundingly requested a family thrill ride as the reason for choosing Powder Keg.

A trip on Powder Keg lasts nearly three minutes and spirals around six acres on 3,500 feet of track. The ride carries more than 1,000 people per hour with 16 passengers per train. Silver Dollar City’s Corporate Development team and the Maintenance & Construction Division are handling theming and construction.

 

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Edited by robbalvey
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Can someone explain what the little track that comes out the launch bit is used for. It looks like the back spike fo a shuttle coaster and can be seen on the parks promotional artwork for the ride. I swear I saw a picture of it on the internet someplace. If I find it i will post it. I was just wondering why they would need a spike of track like a shuttle coaster uses when this is a full cicuit coaster.

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Can someone explain what the little track that comes out the launch bit is used for. It looks like the back spike fo a shuttle coaster and can be seen on the parks promotional artwork for the ride. I swear I saw a picture of it on the internet someplace. If I find it i will post it. I was just wondering why they would need a spike of track like a shuttle coaster uses when this is a full cicuit coaster.

 

I believe the back spike is in case of a rollback of a train not clearing the first hill. PK is a full circuit but it is a 'disconnected full circuit' for lack of a better term. There is a transfer track that connects the lower end portion of the ride to the upper portion where the back spike and launch area is. The transfer table goes up an incline due to the topography of SDC which amongst other things is going to make this a unique ride.

Glad to know that PK will most likely be up and running on March 17 when the park opens for the season.

 

JW

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Whoa, pretty neat! I was all thinking why does a Rocket Coaster have that track, then I reread and realized it's an S&S design. Still hard to picture a fast launched coaster with that sort of track!

 

Some people were expecting the rubber tires like the other S&S. But PK utilizes quite a bit of the Buzzsaw Falls track like the chain lift hill and the helix that leeds up to the chain lift which was from Premier.

 

Jim W

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I can't understand why SDC removed Buzzsaw Falls, in my opinion a much much nicer ride than this S&S / Arrow crap.

It looks so, so tacky, so bizarre. The way the hills are shaped, the curves, the supports, the trains, etc. Almost no logic or imagination in all of that.

 

S&S should be banned from the coaster business...maybe only as a partner to others, to develop air launch systems or something.

Their towers are awesome, their ideas are great, but the coasters I've seen so far are rubbish. Same for Arrow, lol.

 

Oh well, let's hope it's a good ride. I wonder how they'll use the vertical spike.

Edited by BDG
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hey the disneyland anniversary is coming up on May 3rd i think and i was wondering if you guys are gonna be there for it? or are you gonna wait a while for the crowd to die down? because i know that space mountain is gonna be brand new and the pirates of the carribean might have some new puppets of jack sparrow. so we'll see. hopefully they do a good job and i know they will. there disney. they can never do a bad job.

 

-Aris

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look at this old disneyland ride back in the 60's or 70's. that would be cool if they still had it goin.

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