August 11, 20178 yr comment_251692 Went to Chessington Zoo last week and in the Vampire train station, I noticed they changed the depart announcement, which is the most cringiest announcement ever. That laugh at the end is so fake and horrible. Why would they go from an epic one last year to this horrible sounding one for this year? Does anyone really know why they have changed it?
August 15, 20178 yr comment_251741 I think to add in some extra line about the new gates or a new rule theyve introduced. Instead of the hissy internet download they're playing now, the station music used to have the organ part (solo) playing from the actual organ, in sync with the rest the music (the original mix) coming in for the chorus through the rest the station. All that setup is gone now. Today the downloaded station music is now played all through the queue from cheap speakers too, so you are long since bored of it before you even reach the station anyway! When guests are paying this much, this completely amateaur approach to themed audio takes a very jaded & clueless attitude, same with what happened to Tomb Blaster in 2016. It's criminal how pathetic Vampire is now when it used to be brilliant. Terribly lit, stripped back scenery, wobbly organist and the once cool music now feels token and lame. But they will never spend the money to professionally restore the ride, even thought 80% of it is there and Merlin can easily afford it. So it'll carry on feeling DIY, homemade props in the queue here and flashing LEDs on demo mode there.
August 15, 20178 yr comment_251745 3 hours ago, Wumbamillio said: wobbly organist Static organist now actually.
August 15, 20178 yr comment_251751 5 hours ago, StevenVig said: Static organist now actually. The way Chessington are going with removing stuff from the station, it'll be no organist eventually...
August 16, 20178 yr comment_251765 Chessington are just laughable sometimes. Post on their FB page to celebrate national rollercoaster day says: "did you know in 2002 Vampire became the WORLD’s first floorless rollercoaster?!"
August 16, 20178 yr comment_251771 Amazing. I also just saw some of the things they've been posting for the new scaremaze... Its so so cringey. Is their marketing team a bunch of 8 year olds?
August 16, 20178 yr comment_251790 Laughable and proves the complete lack of care, knowledge and understanding of theme parks the park has. So unprofessional!
August 16, 20178 yr comment_251793 It was awesome when Chessington built sizeable rides that were surprising, inventive, bold, that bit different for families. It was always fairly simple but had a great fun edge and quality, not cheap imitations and very commercial/sentimental. The park has really been thrown to amateaurs and has no real direction now. Well it's been that way for 15 years. Sad that Vampire is now so cheap feeling and DIY, it's really a big tombstone for the early ambitious days of the park.
August 17, 20178 yr comment_251821 15 hours ago, Wumbamillio said: Sad that Vampire is now so cheap feeling and DIY, it's really a big tombstone for the early ambitious days of the park. Agreed. Compared to when Chessington weren't afraid to use movie-style sets, facades and special effects, it's now quite apparent that the first consideration they take with every "refurbishment" is where their nearest B&Q is...
August 19, 20178 yr comment_251916 On 19/01/2017 at 1:46 PM, pluk said: The problem that causes the discomfort is the trains seem to not be solidly coupled which causes them to shuffle back and forth into each other as it travels along the track. This isn't really noticeable at the front or back but is worse in the middle of the train. Swinging side to side softly is fun, jerking back and forth not so much. The ride always did the odd "shuffling" thing even in the pre-Vekoma days although I agree it's worse with the current trains it does seem to be a characteristic of that type of ride as Ninja and Iron Dragon definitely do that too. It still pains me to hear talk of a good day on The Vampire being 400-600pph... Back in the ride's early days they were getting well over 1700pph with a good crew and 3-train operations. I can certainly remember when we went in 1991 we parked in the grass car park and the queue started more or less where the gates are at the path from the south entrance, despite that and the full queue being open we were on within 30min. Heaven knows how long a similar queue would take now! Even later in the 1990s they were dispatching trains so fast that they would slow lift 1 to allow the right spacing and avoid stops in the (then) pitch dark transfer station. It was actually very rare for lift 2 to slow back then! The whole issue with the trains parking so slowly is so frustrating as it's obviously perfectly possible to program a control system to work like it worked for the first ten years of operation... to me the way the trains used to thunder round the corner into the station before the chorus of hisses and chirps from the brakes brought the train to a stop (one stop, right place every time) was a key part of the ride's theatre and obviously it helped maintain a good throughput. I know it'll never happen but for me if the park were to make a nod to their history and do a sympathetic restoration it would really bring something to the market at a time when new low-capacity gimmicks (VR anyone?) are ruining many parks. (I) ask Vekoma to engineer some new enclosed "bat" trains with their new vest style harnesses. Have three six-car trains, as this would allow some reconfiguration of the blocks to allow for all three trains to be in the station area if needed but maintain a good capacity of 1400-1500pph. (ii) install a decent control unit that parks the trains more efficiently. (iii) repaint the ride and restore the rock work around the tunnel. (iv) restore the station and use the original entrance. I can dream!!!
August 20, 20178 yr comment_251920 I am pretty sure the old trains didn't have seat belts on the restraints which would have been a factor into slowing down loading since the current trains were put in place.
August 20, 20178 yr comment_251921 1 hour ago, Mattgwise said: I am pretty sure the old trains didn't have seat belts on the restraints which would have been a factor into slowing down loading since the current trains were put in place. Vampire, on 3 new trains was still able to get quick dispatches, its just operations and need have slowed down.
August 20, 20178 yr comment_251922 6 hours ago, RobF said: Vampire, on 3 new trains was still able to get quick dispatches, its just operations and need have slowed down. Yes, certainly I remember in the early days of the new trains once they'd fixed the initial issues with the guide wheel of the front car slamming into the guide rail at the base of the second lift they started using all 3 trains and were dispatching at 75-80sec intervals quite reliably. Most of the recent videos I've seen they are stacking even with only 2 trains which is absolutely shocking - the correct interval with 2 trains is to dispatch when the previous train detaches from lift 2!
August 20, 20178 yr comment_251923 They deliberately stack them now. Its ludicrous but they have little to no faith in their ride systems actually working.
October 29, 20177 yr comment_253669 I think Vekoma should Re - Furbish the track with their new track (like in Flight of the Pterosaur) to make it smoother. If you don't go in 1st or 2nd row it will have little jolts randomly across the ride. I don't think the trains should change though as withouts the swings it just won't be Vampire!
June 17, 20187 yr comment_258643 How long you guys think Vampire has got left? Personally I think it has 2/3 more years left. Most Arrow suspended Coasters had a life of around 25 years, Vampires in its 28th year. Big Bad Wolf at Busch Gardens was removed after 25 years and that looked like a better maintained coaster than Vampire. Will it take a horrific accident for Chessington to start thinking of its removal?
June 17, 20187 yr comment_258644 Vampire will keep going until it’s too costly to repair, I think it’s been said many times before that the park would never get permission for that sort of ride these days due to the noise complaints so removing it is off the cards.
June 18, 20187 yr comment_258654 8 hours ago, Marley said: How long you guys think Vampire has got left? Personally I think it has 2/3 more years left. Most Arrow suspended Coasters had a life of around 25 years, Vampires in its 28th year. Big Bad Wolf at Busch Gardens was removed after 25 years and that looked like a better maintained coaster than Vampire. Will it take a horrific accident for Chessington to start thinking of its removal? Vampire is in a unique position where it's still the most popular ride at the park and hasn't been overtaken by any new rollercoasters. I think it will outlive the other four suspended rides that still exist. All Vampire really needs is a refurbishment as it looks terrible.
June 18, 20187 yr comment_258655 I expect they will keep Vampire going for as long as possible, due to what many have said above. Were Vampire to ever be removed, unfortunately they would not be replace it with anything on the same scale, due to strict planning laws. It literally doesn’t help that the park is literally encompassed with green belt, which makes building anything on a noticeable scale extremely difficult. Thry even had to dig down for Zufari because NIMBYs complained of the giraffes being too tall. As lost as Vampire is structurally Sound, I cant see it going anywhere. Ideally a refurbishment is what it’ll get (whilst staying to it’s golden roots). Another updated set of trains would be nice. I wonder if the Sansei Vekoma purchase makes a new generation Swinging coaster possible?
June 18, 20187 yr comment_258657 19 hours ago, Marley said: Will it take a horrific accident for Chessington to start thinking of its removal? So long as they maintain it properly, there’s no reason to think any accident will take place... Ride safety standards are very high in the U.K. They’d be very silly to remove The Vampire in the near future. It’s the park’s most popular and renowned attraction, I struggle to think of any other park that is as reliant on one major attraction as Chessington is on the Vampire. There have probably been talks of rethemeing it no doubt, but an actual removal is hard to fathom. Least not because it’s location would be totally useless if they did remove it... given they’re not allowed to use it for another major attraction.... Unless something dramatic changes, the first roller coaster to be removed from Chessington will be Dragon’s Fury. Followed by Rattlesnake. Not in the immediate future, but those rides were not built to last in the same way Vampire was, nor to cope with the pressure they’re under crowd wise. The benefit with Vampire is that the Arrow structure is super sturdy, hence it’s far less susceptible to cracks in the way Fury is for example. It was certainly built to last, and the Vekoma modification ought only to have improved that. Relatively minor work like lift hill replacements might have to be done, as the clanky chain system is outdated (especially for durability on 3 train operation), but other than that the ride should last.
June 18, 20187 yr comment_258658 Get Vekoma in again and do a complete refurb, new track, new lift hills (tyre driven ftw) and above all, get those bloody fab SFC trains on there... Though they'd need a new blocking system, I doubt tyre lifts would cope with a lot of stop/starting (if they can even do it of course)...
June 18, 20187 yr comment_258662 I'm sure if they got vekoma in and completed a full refurb including retrack the ride wouldnt need new planning permission ?
June 18, 20187 yr comment_258663 Vampire is still the most popular attraction at Chessington for sure. Ideally a retrack without planning permission & refurb would be the best option if possible. No doubt Arrow made it a solid ride. The supports alone are huge! Compare that to Fury where parts of the track wobble. My latest ride on it was noticeably rough as if one set of wheels were worn down. It was jerking forwards and backwards. Even then, Chessington can’t afford to lose Vampire.
June 18, 20187 yr comment_258665 On 6/17/2018 at 7:36 PM, Marley said: How long you guys think Vampire has got left? Personally I think it has 2/3 more years left. Most Arrow suspended Coasters had a life of around 25 years, Vampires in its 28th year. Big Bad Wolf at Busch Gardens was removed after 25 years and that looked like a better maintained coaster than Vampire. Will it take a horrific accident for Chessington to start thinking of its removal? The big difference is that the other swinging suspended coasters still kept their original trains. Vampire had replacement trains a few years ago from Vekoma (who are still in business unlike Arrow). As long as the structure is still sound/can be repaired then it'll stay, it may need a big overhaul at some point in the medium term however.
June 19, 20187 yr comment_258666 10 hours ago, Stuntman707 said: Vampire is still the most popular attraction at Chessington for sure. Ideally a retrack without planning permission & refurb would be the best option if possible. No doubt Arrow made it a solid ride. The supports alone are huge! Compare that to Fury where parts of the track wobble. My latest ride on it was noticeably rough as if one set of wheels were worn down. It was jerking forwards and backwards. Even then, Chessington can’t afford to lose Vampire. That's deliberate, steel needs to have some give in it, otherwise it could be problematic... Even Nemesis' track bends, particularly after the zero-g...
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.