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An amusement can make for a great way to spend a weekend or your summer vacation. However, amusement park owners and staff have a lot on their plates when it comes to creating the perfect getaway. Roller coasters aren’t just thrilling; they’re potentially dangerous under the wrong conditions. Here’s what you need to know about the safety behind creating and maintaining roller coasters.
Design
All things considered, roller coasters aren’t altogether complex machines. The moniker of roller coaster even alludes to this. Rather than being propelled, it costs, in the same way that antique minecarts operated. There are a few exceptions to this, however. For one thing, rollers have to ascend as well as descend, and that necessitates a lifting mechanism on upward inclines throughout the track. A coaster will also require a RTU with which your staff can operate the coaster remotely. Most importantly, however, a roller coaster’s track needs to be designed with exact physics calculations taken into consideration. Because roller coasters are designed to accelerate wildly, the track needs to accommodate that kind of speed with gentler curves, for example. Too much speed at too sharp of an angle can see the coaster tipping over or flying from the tracks. This needs to be ironed out early on, because the piecemeal design will give way to a more rigid structure when all of the pieces are welded together.
Assembly
The design and manufacturer of your coaster’s tracks out of the way, it’s time to piece them together. Creating the schematic for a roller coaster is essential, but adhering to that plan is even more crucial to the safety of the design. Because of the gravity defying bravado of roller coasters, the assembly process constitutes a potential hazard for workers, and proper safety protocols will need to be followed to the letter. Assembling the coaster will also require great attention to detail, because failing to weld a spot or misaligning pieces can cause tremendous problems. In the best case scenario, this kind of error is caught before the point of no return in the welding process and some work will have to be redone. However, failing to catch these errors in time will lead to a complete do over that will waste your time and money. While your team will need to be attentive and precise, you’ll also need a foreman that can watch over the proceedings to ensure big picture success in addition to the fine details.
Testing
Last, but certainly not least, is the testing phase of the project. Regardless of how well thought out your plan was and how well your workers adhered to that plan, testing is a necessity. The process of testing a roller is fairly simple on paper. The coaster will need to run without passengers several times without incident, with the tests themselves working to suss out any mechanical or construction issues that might cause an accident. This includes stress testing, a method of testing machines in which the machine is run at maximum capacity in order to encourage any potential flaws to reveal themselves. However, proper testing will also need to have a human element, so roller coaster testers will take a few rides once preliminary testing has proved successful. Luckily, the science of assembling a coaster is fairly simple. As long as you have competent contractors at your disposal and quality parts on hand, the testing phase should generally go well.
The rides at amusement parks these days are nothing like the log flumes of the past. They tend to be gargantuan machines capable of giving customers a thrilling experience. However, negligence on the part of the manufacturers, designers, and laborers can lead to tragic results. By ensuring that your coaster is made from quality parts and assembled by skilled hands, you can guarantee your customers safe passage. This outline can help you do just that.