Vampire

[Matt N]

I reckon that if Vampire's trains were to be replaced with anything, it would be the Vekoma SFC-style trains with overhead lap bars. They're easy to source, and they're also brilliantly comfortable; I feel that they would be a huge improvement on the current rolling stock!

 

Personally, I'd actually remove Vampire rather than retrack it. I don't think it's as iconic as something like Nemesis, and I have high faith that Merlin could replace it with something superior (perhaps not directly, what with the council's issues with that site, but I certainly think that they could provide it with a far superior spiritual successor).

 

Admittedly, I only rode it once back in 2014, but I controversially wasn't a huge fan of it; I remember it being surprisingly rough, and having numerous dead spots in its layout. That was admittedly based on one ride a very long time ago, however; I should probably get back on it and make a fairer judgement.

[Theme Park Fanatic]

19 hours ago, Matt N said:

I reckon that if Vampire's trains were to be replaced with anything, it would be the Vekoma SFC-style trains with overhead lap bars. They're easy to source, and they're also brilliantly comfortable; I feel that they would be a huge improvement on the current rolling stock!

 

Personally, I'd actually remove Vampire rather than retrack it. I don't think it's as iconic as something like Nemesis, and I have high faith that Merlin could replace it with something superior (perhaps not directly, what with the council's issues with that site, but I certainly think that they could provide it with a far superior spiritual successor).

 

Admittedly, I only rode it once back in 2014, but I controversially wasn't a huge fan of it; I remember it being surprisingly rough, and having numerous dead spots in its layout. That was admittedly based on one ride a very long time ago, however; I should probably get back on it and make a fairer judgement.

@Matt N I’d have to disagree with you for once. Vampire is extremely iconic even more than Nemesis at Alton Towers. Vampire was the Rollercoaster that made Chessington the success it is. Without Vampire Chessington would be nowhere on the scale it is. Although iconic Nemesis doesn’t represent the success of Alton Towers. Nemesis is purely iconic as it was the first Rollercoaster in the U.K to have more than one Inversion (Loop). Both rides were created by the highly successful John Wardley. In some respects Vampire was the prototype for Nemesis. Vampire is like a toned down and simplified version of Nemesis. 
 

If Vampire left Chessington it wouldn’t be the same Theme Park. Vampire is the beating heart of Chessington. Not only is the ride iconic in the success of the Theme Park but it’s definitely Chessington’s most popular ride. The standard que time for Vampire is at least an hour. Compare this to the other Rollercoasters that normally have ques under half an hour,and it becomes apparent just how beloved Vampire is. Personally Vampire is my favourite Rollercoaster at Chessington.

[Benin]

I'd say the queue for Vampire being over an hour is down to Chessie's poor operational standards on top of being the big ride. Especially for those between 1.1-1.2m.

 

I miss 3 train Vampire.

[Matt N]

Interestingly, queue-times.com, a website that monitors live queue data from Chessington and has done for many years, actually indicates that Dragon’s Fury has the park’s longest average queue time, averaging 44 minutes on a regular day and 63 minutes on a peak day: https://queue-times.com/parks/3/stats

 

Admittedly, Vampire comes in a close second, averaging 42 minutes on a regular day and 62 minutes on a peak day, but that’s hardly the landslide win for Vampire that’s being implied. Assuming both have similar throughputs to one another (and many reports would imply that they do, in recent times at least), then this data would suggest that Dragon’s Fury has just as much right to the mantle of “flagship attraction at Chessington” as Vampire does, if not more.

 

I also personally disagree that Vampire is “more iconic” than Nemesis at Alton Towers. I was not alive when Nemesis opened, but I’m led to believe that Nemesis had an outstanding nationwide marketing campaign that made sure that literally everyone knew about it, and it cannot be denied that Nemesis saw Alton Towers’ attendance skyrocket to levels never seen before or since (1994 was by far the park’s highest ever year, with Merlin’s graph showing that a figure of around 3.3 million was attained, and the only time that the park has even exceeded 3 million since was in 2010), so I’d argue that Nemesis “made” Alton Towers just as much as Vampire “made” Chessington if not more. Not to mention that it’s a world renowned roller coaster at the UK’s most popular theme park; millions of people have ridden it, and millions of people still revere it; you only have to look at the ruckus caused in the days since its “closure” was announced. Even down here in the South West, a great many people I know heard about the Nemesis closure announcement and expressed sadness. Would Vampire closing stir the same kind of reaction? I’m not so sure; it may have been brilliant for Chessington back in the day, but I simply don’t think that it’s a countrywide coaster icon in quite the same way as Nemesis.

 

Admittedly, though, how “iconic” a ride is is very subjective and incredibly hard to measure.

[coasterverse]

Rode Vampire for the first time today and sheesh she’s a rough old girl ain’t she?! She is pretty bloody good though I must admit - that helix near the end packs quite a punch!

[Mark9]

On 5/27/2023 at 12:49 AM, coasterverse said:

Rode Vampire for the first time today and sheesh she’s a rough old girl ain’t she?! She is pretty bloody good though I must admit - that helix near the end packs quite a punch!

 

Yeah she is getting on a bit now, almost 35 years old. I would love for it to get a bit of love now that Mandrill is open. 

[Matt N]

It’s funny you should say that, because Chessington Buzz reported back in April that the ride is rumoured to be closing at the end of this season for a Nemesis-style retrack, reopening in March 2025 for its 35th anniversary:

Take this with as much salt as you like, but Chessington Buzz seem to be very reliable for predicting Chessington’s future plans, for what it’s worth.

[MattyB]

Had a random thought the other day about this.  Was thinking wouldn't it be cool if they could somehow reconfigure the station to allow for the new flying trains from Vekoma?  Also replace the chain lifts with launched lifts.  Barrel roll after the tunnel exit. Only potential downside would be a height restriction increase - think FLY is 1.4m?

[Jack29]

Does Vampire only operate 2x trains as the norm these days? I visited for the first time in years the other day and couldn't work out why with such a long queue. Years ago the spare train(s) would be parked up in the tunnel however the third was nowhere to be seen. 

[RobF]

1 hour ago, Jack29 said:

Does Vampire only operate 2x trains as the norm these days? I visited for the first time in years the other day and couldn't work out why with such a long queue. Years ago the spare train(s) would be parked up in the tunnel however the third was nowhere to be seen. 

The third train was used for parts, many reasons lead to this, but 3 train vampire is no more.

[Benin]

Been over a decade without a 3rd train.

 

Wouldn't be surprised if the constant stacking and change of focus on 'good' operations caused far more problems and they probably decided to cannibalise it.

[Matt 236]

2011 I believe was the last season Vampire ran three trains. 
 

It was cannibalised and used for spare parts after that, which given the operational problems they’ve had this year probably shouldn’t have happened. 
 

Essentially the teams (then 6 platform staff) would have about 30 seconds to unload and load trains in the station. So it was fast-paced environment. Something that probably wouldn’t work now with the higher amount of (post-Smiler) spot checks and queue placements. 
 

The ride could do with a substantial refit (akin to 2002) to improve the capacity, longevity and reliability of this popular yet ageing attraction. Like much of the park.

[Mark9]

5 hours ago, Exodus Matt said:

Essentially the teams (then 6 platform staff) would have about 30 seconds to unload and load trains in the station. So it was fast-paced environment. Something that probably wouldn’t work now with the higher amount of (post-Smiler) spot checks and queue placements. 
 

 

 

Can I just throw out there, that back on 3 trains it was so much fun to get those trains in and out in 30 seconds. Everyone from area managers to ride platformers just put their all into running Vampire to its maximum. Yes it was hard work but it was truly rewarding and it was something that everyone aspired to do well. 

 

In this age of hour long RAP queues and everyone just adding so many levels of faff to what is actually a really easy to run ride, Vampire more then most shows the downfall in standards on a lot of UK rides. Back then, missing 1000 an hour was a disappointment. Now, hitting 400 is seen as an achievement. 

[Matt N]

Based on my experience yesterday, the ride needs more staff before they should even think about bringing back the 3rd train. One operator was handling both batching of main queue guests and restraint checking for the entire right hand side of the train, and another was handling both the batching of RAP guests and restraint checking for the entire left hand side of the train.

 

These two staff were working very hard and doing a prompt job, but the lack of additional staff definitely slowed things down on there. The whole process of the operator checking restraints, pressing the send button and then having to jump over the separating fence, batch main queue guests and then jump back over to repeat the whole process again was definitely adding inefficiency, and as a result, I timed a throughput average of 418pph, which equates to an average dispatch interval of 3.5-4 minutes. In some of the slowest cases, I timed dispatch intervals of over 4 minutes. This is on a ride that I would have said was fairly easy to attain quick dispatch intervals on on paper, so I'd wager that the staffing was at very least a significant contributing factor to the low throughput.

 

Stacking was routine on 2 trains, and I certainly don't think a 3rd would have been of any benefit yesterday; for the time being, I feel that they'd get far more benefit out of investing into 2 additional bayloading staff than they would out of investing into reinstating the 3rd train.

[Benin]

Used to be 4 platformers, a Fastrack batcher and a RAP person (who usually ended up helping out platforming) for 3 trains.

 

Not sure if the demand to work at parks is decent these days. But 3 train Vampire was absolutely great to work on, one of the few things I do miss about working at Chessie.

[Mark9]

6 minutes ago, Benin said:

Used to be 4 platformers, a Fastrack batcher and a RAP person (who usually ended up helping out platforming) for 3 trains.

 

Not sure if the demand to work at parks is decent these days. But 3 train Vampire was absolutely great to work on, one of the few things I do miss about working at Chessie.

 

They struggle to employ and retain because the pay is garbage and the working conditions are awful. They've got a management team who think sitting in an office and claiming how great they are is an acceptable way to run a team of people. 

 

They would rather run the park like it's closing down. 

[Benin]

39 minutes ago, Mark9 said:

 

They struggle to employ and retain because the pay is garbage and the working conditions are awful. They've got a management team who think sitting in an office and claiming how great they are is an acceptable way to run a team of people. 

 

They would rather run the park like it's closing down. 

 

So, no change from 2009 then? 😉

[Paultons Parkway]

I remember the last time I rode Vampire was back in 2011 when it was the full 3 trains. With time flying and the ride aging rapidly since then, I am keen to go up sometime before the end of this season to give it another few tries.

 

Realistically I want to go on a day when there are fewer crowds (preferably a weekday) and make Vampire the first ride of the day. My reasoning is because I expect Vampire will have the longest queues with the reduced number of trains not helping. Even with very few guests at the park (as I would expect on a working day in term time), I would be keen to know if queues can still get above 1 hour if there is only one train in operation.
 

Also I am likely to arrive by public transport so would be using the North entrance, and IIRC it’s a 10 minute walk from there to the Vampire queue entrance. I am a pretty fast walker and assuming I arrive at 10am on the dot, how much of a queue is there likely to be by the time I get to the Vampire entrance?

[Mark9]

8 hours ago, Benin said:

 

So, no change from 2009 then? 😉

 

We worked in a golden age compared to what they put up with now.

[Cal]

On 9/19/2023 at 4:05 PM, Paultons Parkway said:

Realistically I want to go on a day when there are fewer crowds (preferably a weekday) and make Vampire the first ride of the day. My reasoning is because I expect Vampire will have the longest queues with the reduced number of trains not helping. Even with very few guests at the park (as I would expect on a working day in term time), I would be keen to know if queues can still get above 1 hour if there is only one train in operation.
 

Also I am likely to arrive by public transport so would be using the North entrance, and IIRC it’s a 10 minute walk from there to the Vampire queue entrance. I am a pretty fast walker and assuming I arrive at 10am on the dot, how much of a queue is there likely to be by the time I get to the Vampire entrance?

 

If you go on a weekday term time, you shouldn't expect it to have a queue all day

 

I went a couple weeks ago during the week and it was empty. It was running 2 trains, but they were only loading the front half of 1 train, which was a bit annoying as it meant I couldn't get a back row ride.

 

They were dispatching the empty train as soon as the the other train was on lift 2, so it was nice having the 2 trains going round at the same time. A very rare sight nowadays

[Benin]

Probably only loading the front end to make sure it has enough momentum to make it through the sensors for lift 2 and final brakes.

 

Was always amusing to have to run over to lift 2 and give it a push start.

[Paultons Parkway]

11 hours ago, Cal said:

 

If you go on a weekday term time, you shouldn't expect it to have a queue all day

 

I went a couple weeks ago during the week and it was empty. It was running 2 trains, but they were only loading the front half of 1 train, which was a bit annoying as it meant I couldn't get a back row ride.

 

They were dispatching the empty train as soon as the the other train was on lift 2, so it was nice having the 2 trains going round at the same time. A very rare sight nowadays

Thanks for the reply.

 

I’ve had a look on the Chessington Live queue time website and it appears that all the big rides (including Vampire) are closed right now. Was wondering if this is a weekday term time thing - I’d imagine on a day with lower demand they’d want to keep fewer rides open, particularly if short-staffed. Still a bit strange why they’d keep the kiddie rides open and close the most of the big rides though.

[Cal]

3 hours ago, Benin said:

Probably only loading the front end to make sure it has enough momentum to make it through the sensors for lift 2 and final brakes.

 

Was always amusing to have to run over to lift 2 and give it a push start.

Interesting! I remember being pushed on the final breaks back in the day but I didn’t realise that was an issue on lift 2 as well. 
 

1 hour ago, Paultons Parkway said:

Thanks for the reply.

 

I’ve had a look on the Chessington Live queue time website and it appears that all the big rides (including Vampire) are closed right now. Was wondering if this is a weekday term time thing - I’d imagine on a day with lower demand they’d want to keep fewer rides open, particularly if short-staffed. Still a bit strange why they’d keep the kiddie rides open and close the most of the big rides though.

 

I imagine that’s just Chessingtons standard poor reliability. Having a look on the app now everything is open apart from vampire which is scheduled to open from 12. 
 

They’ve been closing Wild Asia, Tiger Rock and Zufari at 3:30 on off peak days for a while but this seems to have stopped for now. 

[Matt 236]

Having just visited on my first low peak visit in years, I can safely say the following.

 

Vampire (like mentioned) was running two trains, but only loading most of 1. Several rows were left empty at the back, probably either due to train momentum or RAP queue. It broke down permanently for the rest of the day.

 

Dragons Fury opened late, but was spinning like mad. Zufari and Croc drop were closed all day, Rattlesnake seemed to only run one train on the track at a time. The water was working on Monkey Swinger. The state of the snake theming in Jumanji was just appalling. 

 

Though an enjoyable day was had, the pitfalls of the park and its current operating model were highly visible and certainly detracted in some ways. My non-enthusiast mates I went with, also noticed these. Unsurprisingly there is still no update on Scorpion, but I assume the news of its closure is imminent now.

 

 

[Theme Park Fanatic]

To be fair to CHessington the detoration of the Jumanji theming could be beyond their control. During the closed Season leading into 2021 the entire themed claddiwork on Croc Drop had to be replaced. The cladding had lost colour and was disintegrating. The culprits for this were Pigeons eating the sister and using Croc Drop as a toilet. To be fair to Chessington they rectified the marital with stuff that wouldn't be wrecked by bird poo. I suspect the same problem has occurred with the Jumanji theming. I expect that during the Closed Season Jumanji will receive the treatment Croc Drop did.