Mack Rides is surely the most direct example of a synergy in between joy and technique. This a rollercoaster company based in Germany has revealed for us its history, methods and creative process.
Units Research Review : How the company started to work in the roller coaster field ?
Mack Rides Engineering Team : The Mack family founded the family business in 1780 here in Waldkirch Germany. Paul Mack was a craftsman, who was responsible for the water distribution here in the town and who created small carriages at that time. Over the decades the carriages grew and the Mack family became a well-known company for transportation wagons for people and goods. The wagons were used by construction crews, the circus and others that needed mobile temporary homes. This is where the link to the carnival comes into our history. Our hometown Waldkirch is very well known as an organ building city with many businesses in that field. Those organs were a key element on many fair grounds but they were quite large and heavy. For their transportation the organ manufacturers asked our company to build mobile platforms to transport the music instrument from one place to another. We then created also a lot of spare parts for carousels and by the time we got into the business of amusement rides.
Our first roller coaster was built in 1921 in the city of Basel, right across the Rhein river in Switzerland. The times were quite hard for the industry as the inflation hit Germany quite hard at that time. The more happy the company was to build a project in Switzerland and getting also paid in swiss francs.
The coaster itself was a wooden coaster with single cars and a spiral lift system. Actually the same idea was used for our coasters Eurosat and Euromir at Europa-Park. The wooden coaster was a transportable ride that toured quite a lot and was at one point sold first to Tivoli in Denmark and after that to a park in Sweden where it burnt down in the 1950s.
U.R.R Can you explain to us the process to design a Roller Coaster ?
M.R.E.T To design a rollercoaster it takes several steps that are basically always the same:
U.R.R: In this Roller Coaster field, where the innovation come from, is it rough creativity? Technical development ? or both ?
M.R.E.T: Basically it’s creativity and the drive to bring something new to the market that has never been done before. Of course there are limitations of forces and what is technically possible, but we try to think of new ways and ideas constantly and discuss them on a regular schedule.
Many layout elements are taken from the aerobatics and also named like them. But of course we also look into other high-adrenaline sports in order to create a similar experience but for a much broader theme park audience.
Some of the ideas and innovations are a next development step and kind of an evolution of older rides. New technologies and approaches help us to create a new ride product. Just like the launch coaster – without the innovation of a linear synchronous motor we would not have been in the position to create such a product. So it’s not always the innovation of our company but also what is available from sub-contractors.
U.R.R: How do you prototype a new roller coaster?
M.R.E.T : Today it’s all done by computer simulation. We can take the whole different elements and virtually go anywhere on the fly or we even can take parts of our trains and push them through the virtual track to see how they behave and if there are any collisions we need to take care of.
In the pre-computer era we were setting up all our rides and rollercoasters in our factory and test them over and over again until we would dismantle and ship them. At the parks we would then set them up again and test and commission them. As this process limits us in time and space, we are happy to have this powerful simulations in order to build higher and longer rides than in the past.
Of course some ride systems today have still prototypes that we try to test on a small scale in order to get a sense of the feeling. But that’s rather rare and we do 80% by simulation.
U.R.R: What is the early process to “get” the sensation people will endure throughout the ride?
M.R.E.T: The sensation of a rollercoaster consists of the fear that you have prior to the ride and the relief after the ride. If you are not a regular visitor to theme parks and ride roller coasters each and every day, you get excited what you will experience and what risk you are going to take to do a loop or an inversion. In addition, the element of height is always quite freighting for some.
When it comes to the movements of the car and the passenger’s body we work with different positive and negative g-forces to build another excitement that you probably can’t get unless you are a fighter pilot or a race car driver. All these components combined in a right amount and you will get the perfect rollercoaster.
U.R.R: Most Roller Coaster development tends to communicate about size, speed, height, but is there any other alternative?
M.R.E.T: The communication and marketing of a ride with statistics is nice and easy but many theme parks only rely on that. A good rollercoaster does not need a record. That’s what we always try to communicate. Presenting a world’s first definitely is breaking the news, but in the long run, you will need a good combination of visual and physical excitement.
U.R.R: Roller Coaster are mostly made of raw metallic structures without any concealment of technic, can you explain to us how the visual effect affects the experience of a ride?
M.R.E.T: We work with those visual effects all the time – even when the rollercoaster is not inside of a show building. You can make a roller coaster feel faster, when approaching the outside structures or getting closer to the ground. By adding the dark or directional lights you can trick the passenger’s mind even more and create elements that feel bigger. A great example is our launch coaster Helix in Liseberg that is built to fit exactly to a hillside. From the statistics the coaster is not the highest but the combination of close to the ground and the elements that sit on top of the hill make this coaster outstanding.
The Rocking Boat is also a good example of visual effects on a ride: we have no safe boundaries on the first look. But our technology beneath the water level and therefore outside of the passengers view is all about safety and reliability. Imagine a boat that is on the open water and will be pushed around by the waves – on the first hand this sounds scary and unsafe. On the second look you see the anchor to the ground in order to hold the boat on position. And that is what we are doing: the Rocking Boat is held in place by a second drive car beneath the water level which is connect to the boat above, keeping it in position and stable throughout the whole ride.
U.R.R: What are the most extreme roller coaster that Mack Rides has ever designed?
M.R.E.T: The most extreme roller coaster is a term that I am not very happy about. What is extreme? The most negative forces? The highest? The fastest? Our most ambitious ride was until today Helix at the Swedish park Liseberg: 7 Inversions, 2 launch elements, a very open seat concept.
U.R.R: People often think that mechanical engineering has a very serious connotation, but here engineering is here to “make people smile”, can you talk about this confrontation of enjoyment and technic ?
M.R.E.T: For my colleagues and me it is a very special thing to work in an industry that is all about creating fun. With our showfloor just 30 minutes from our company away, we often visit Europa-Park and see the reactions of the visitors that were created by our rides. It is a great feeling to go to work and to know that you create a product that’s only purpose is to bring excitement and joy.
