RC Restraint Devices
KFP10466
Last night, while watching The Langoliers, I watched the pilot strap
himeslf in. The seat beats came over his shoulders and buckled in his
crotch. The $64,000 question is, why can they do that on coasters instead
of those over head torture restraints al a Arrow????????
Wouldn't these supply sufficient protection and comfort???
kfp1...@aol.com
"i coast, therefore i am"
While riding the Internet, please keep hands,arms and legs inside the car
at all times.
Iron Dragon- The "Diet Rite" of Rollercoasters ( lots fizzle but no fizz )
Dave Althoff
: Last night, while watching The Langoliers, I watched the pilot strap
: himeslf in. The seat beats came over his shoulders and buckled in his
: crotch. The $64,000 question is, why can they do that on coasters instead
: of those over head torture restraints al a Arrow????????
: Wouldn't these supply sufficient protection and comfort???
Answer to last question: Yes, and no. (sufficient protection,
insufficient comfort). The answer to the first question is that it would
dramatically slow down the load time on the coaster...to fasten, then
check, all of those straps. Add to that the fact that coaster riders come
in a wide variety of sizes, and 5-point harnesses are a bit limited in
this regard.
The truth of the matter is that there is absolutely no reason at all why
any roller-coaster restraint must come over the rider's shoulders. For a
multi-element looper, a ratcheting lap bar would be sufficient. The
forces exerted by the ride are sufficient to keep the riders in their
seats; the lap bars merely keep them from exiting on their own, and serve
to limit the position of the rider. A ratcheting lap bar would do
this...and in fact, on older Schwarzkopf loopers, does quite nicely. Bear
in mind that, unlike the shoulders, the thighs are engineered to handle
large loads (such as your entire body weight) and therefore could safely
hold a person in a seat. My unpleasant experience on a Skymaster ride
proves that the same is not true of the shoulders.
Other than for psychological reasons, the only reason to use an overhead
restraint is to prevent the rider from leaning forward at an inopportune
moment. This could be done with a lap bar by using the type of lap bar
design found on the post-Snake-River-Falls Arrow shoot-the-chute rides.
I'll shut up now, since my opinions on this issue are VERY well known here...!
--Dave Althoff, Jr.
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DRRounds
>The truth of the matter is that there is absolutely no reason at all why
>any roller-coaster restraint must come over the rider's shoulders. For a
>multi-element looper, a ratcheting lap bar would be sufficient. The
>forces exerted by the ride are sufficient to keep the riders in their
>seats; the lap bars merely keep them from exiting on their own, and serve
>to limit the position of the rider. A ratcheting lap bar would do
>this...and in fact, on older Schwarzkopf loopers, does quite nicely.
I found a good multi-looper (a loop, a spiral, another loop and another
spiral followed by a very fast brake run) that uses only ratcheting lap
bars and enjoyed the ride much more than if it had a "horse-collar". The
ride I am refering to is the "Desert Storm" (O.D. Hopkins, mfg.) at
"Coasters and Castles" in Phoenix AZ. It did not rate in my top ten (for
other reasons), but I do not think that I could have ridden it the 12
times I did, if it had a horse collar type restraint system. Btw, when
you ride this coaster in a seat near the middle of the train, there are
some points where you are thrown forward very rapidly and would positively
know where the shoulder bars were, if it had them.
David Rounds
Donald Gladstone
: I have to agree with Dave on this:
I could have sworn that when I rode it about two years ago that it had
collars. Have they changed them? I don't think my memory is that bad.
PGA Michael