The generic
roller coaster
A roller coaster, or rollercoaster, is a type of amusement ride that employs a form of elevated railroad track designed with tight turns, steep slopes, and sometimes inversions. Passengers ride along the track in open cars, and the rides are o ...
vertical loop, where a section of track causes the riders to complete a 360 degree turn, is the most basic of
roller coaster inversion
A roller coaster inversion is a roller coaster element in which the track turns riders upside-down and then returns them to an upright position. Early forms of inversions were circular in nature and date back to 1848 on the Centrifugal railway in ...
s. At the top of the loop, riders are completely inverted.
History
The vertical loop is not a recent roller coaster innovation. Its origins can be traced back to the 1850s when ''
centrifugal railways'' were built in France and Great Britain.
The rides relied on
centrifugal force
In Newtonian mechanics, the centrifugal force is an inertial force (also called a "fictitious" or "pseudo" force) that appears to act on all objects when viewed in a rotating frame of reference. It is directed away from an axis which is paralle ...
s to hold the car in the loop. One early looping coaster was shut down after an accident.
Later attempts to build a looping roller coaster were carried out during the late 19th century with the ''
Flip Flap Railway
Flip Flap Railway was the name of a looping wooden roller coaster which operated for a number of years at Paul Boyton's Sea Lion Park on Coney Island in Brooklyn, New York. The coaster, which opened in 1895, was the first looping roller coaster ...
'' at
Sea Lion Park
Sea Lion Park was a amusement park started in 1895 on Coney Island by Paul Boyton. He fenced the property and charged admission, the park becoming the first enclosed and permanent amusement park in North America. Up until the establishment of thi ...
. The ride was designed with a completely circular loop (rather than the teardrop shape used by many modern looping roller coasters), and caused neck injuries due to the intense G-forces pulled with the tight radius of the loop.
The next attempt at building a looping roller coaster was in 1901 when Edwin Prescott built the ''
Loop the Loop
The generic roller coaster vertical loop, where a section of track causes the riders to complete a 360 degree turn, is the most basic of roller coaster inversions. At the top of the loop, riders are completely inverted.
History
The vertical ...
'' at
Coney Island
Coney Island is a peninsular neighborhood and entertainment area in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Brighton Beach and Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, Manhattan Beach to its east, L ...
. This ride used the modern teardrop-shaped loop and a steel structure, however more people wanted to watch the attraction, rather than ride. Vertical loops weren't attempted again until the design of
Great American Revolution at
Six Flags Magic Mountain
Six Flags Magic Mountain, formerly known and colloquially referred to as simply Magic Mountain, is a amusement park located in Valencia, California, northwest of downtown Los Angeles. It opened on May 29, 1971, as a development of the Newha ...
, which opened in 1976. Its success depended largely on its
clothoid
An Euler spiral is a curve whose curvature changes linearly with its curve length (the curvature of a circular curve is equal to the reciprocal of the radius). Euler spirals are also commonly referred to as spiros, clothoids, or Cornu spirals.
Eu ...
-based (rather than circular) loop. The loop became a phenomenon, and many parks hastened to build roller coasters featuring them.
In 2000, a modern looping
wooden roller coaster
A wooden roller coaster is a type of roller coaster classified by its wooden track, which consists of running rails made of flat steel strips mounted on laminated wood. The support structure is also typically made of wood, but may also b ...
was built, the
Son of Beast
Son of Beast was a record-breaking wooden roller coaster at Kings Island in Mason, Ohio, United States. Built and designed by the now-defunct Roller Coaster Corporation of America (RCCA), it opened to the public on April 28, 2000, as the talle ...
at
Kings Island
Kings Island is a amusement park located northeast of Cincinnati in Mason, Ohio, United States. Owned and operated by Cedar Fair, the park first opened in 1972 by the Taft Broadcasting Company. It was part of a larger effort to move and expan ...
. Although the ride itself was made of wood, the loop was supported with steel structure. Due to maintenance issues however, the loop was removed at the end of the 2006 season. The loop was not the cause of the ride's issues, but was removed as a precautionary measure. It is the only successful installation of a loop on a wooden roller coaster. Due to an unrelated issue in 2009, Son of Beast was closed until 2012, when Kings Island announced that it would be removed.
On June 22, 2013,
Six Flags Magic Mountain
Six Flags Magic Mountain, formerly known and colloquially referred to as simply Magic Mountain, is a amusement park located in Valencia, California, northwest of downtown Los Angeles. It opened on May 29, 1971, as a development of the Newha ...
introduced
Full Throttle, a steel launch coaster with a loop, the tallest in the world at the time of its opening. , the largest vertical loop is located on Flash, a roller coaster produced by
Mack Rides at Lewa Adventure in Shaanxi, China.
The record is shared by Hyper Coaster in Turkey's Land of Legends theme park, built in 2018, which is identical to Flash at Lewa Adventure.
Loops on non-roller coasters
In 2002, the Swiss company Klarer Freizeitanlagen AG began working on a safe design for a looping water slide. Since then, multiple installations of the slide, named the
AquaLoop
An AquaLoop is a type of water slide, body water slide where single riders are dropped down a near vertical slide and into an Roller coaster elements#Inclined loop, inclined loop. They are usually located in water parks.
History
Austrians, Austr ...
and constructed by companies including Polin, Klarer, Aquarena and
WhiteWater West
WhiteWater West is a manufacturing company based in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada. It was established in 1980 and manufactures a variety of products for water parks including water slides and water play areas. The company also owns FlowRide ...
, have appeared in many parks. This ride does not feature a vertical loop, instead using an
inclined loop
This list of roller coaster elements contains the individual parts of roller coaster design and operation.
Introduction
Roller coaster elements are the individual parts of roller coaster design and operation, such as a track, hill, loop, or turn. ...
(a vertical loop tilted at an angle), which puts less force on the rider. AquaLoop slides feature a safety hatch, which can be opened by a rider in case they do not reach the highest point of the looping.
Physics/Mechanics
![Walygator Comet looping](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6c/Walygator_Comet_looping.jpg)
Most roller coaster loops are not circular in shape. A commonly used shape is the
clothoid
An Euler spiral is a curve whose curvature changes linearly with its curve length (the curvature of a circular curve is equal to the reciprocal of the radius). Euler spirals are also commonly referred to as spiros, clothoids, or Cornu spirals.
Eu ...
loop, which resembles an inverted tear drop and allows for less intense G-forces throughout the element for the rider.
The use of this shape was pioneered in 1976 on
The New Revolution at
Six Flags Magic Mountain
Six Flags Magic Mountain, formerly known and colloquially referred to as simply Magic Mountain, is a amusement park located in Valencia, California, northwest of downtown Los Angeles. It opened on May 29, 1971, as a development of the Newha ...
, by
Werner Stengel
Werner Stengel (born 22 August 1936, in Bochum) is a German roller coaster designer and engineer. Stengel is the founder of Stengel Engineering, also known as Ingenieurbüro Stengel GmbH (or Ingenieurbuero Stengel GmbH).
Stengel first worked on a ...
of leading coaster engineering firm Ing.-Büro Stengel GmbH.
On the way up, from the bottom to the top of the loop, gravity is in opposition to the direction of the cars and will slow the train. The train is slowest at the top of the loop. Once beyond the top, gravity helps to pull the cars down around the bend. If the loop's curvature is constant, the rider is subjected to the greatest force at the bottom. If the curvature of the track changes suddenly, as from level to a circular loop, the greatest force is imposed almost instantly (see
jerk). Gradual changes in curvature, as in the clothoid, reduce the force maximum (permitting more speed) and allow the rider time to cope safely with the changing force.
This "gentling" runs somewhat contrary to the coaster's ''raison d'être''.
Schwarzkopf-designed roller coasters often feature near-circular loops (in case of
Thriller even without any reduction of curvature between two almost perfectly circular loops) resulting in intense rides—a trademark for the designer.
It is rare for a roller coaster to stall in a vertical loop, although this has happened before. The Psyké Underground coaster (then known as Sirocco) at
Walibi Belgium
Walibi Belgium is a Belgian theme park located in Wavre, close to Brussels. It is one of the largest theme parks in Belgium, attracting 1.45 million visitors in 2018 (including visitors to adjoining water park Aqualibi). The park was originally c ...
once stranded riders upside-down for several hours. The design of the trains and the rider restraint system (in this case, a simple lap bar) prevented any injuries from occurring, and the riders were removed with the use of a
cherry picker
An aerial work platform (AWP), also known as an aerial device, elevating work platform (EWP), cherry picker, bucket truck or mobile elevating work platform (MEWP) is a mechanical device used to provide temporary access for people or equipment t ...
. A similar incident occurred on
Demon
A demon is a malevolent supernatural entity. Historically, belief in demons, or stories about demons, occurs in religion, occultism, literature, fiction, mythology, and folklore; as well as in media such as comics, video games, movies, ani ...
at
Six Flags Great America
Six Flags Great America is a amusement park located in Gurnee, Illinois, within the northern Chicago metropolitan area. The amusement park originally opened as Marriott's Great America on May 29, 1976, as one of two theme parks built by the Ma ...
.
References
External links
vertical loop simulatorIng.-Buero Stengel GmbH
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vertical Loop
Roller coaster elements