Life's important question, which ride has the most G's?

Heidelj: Yep, we’ll have the wipes ready if needed. DW still won’t be impressed though! :slight_smile:

will

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Janamelia: Hmm, never thought of trying to look up while spinning, usually heads down spinning the wheel as hard as I can. May give that a try. May regret it too, but hey, that is part of the fun!

will

Oh yeah! Try walking away from your cup afterwards. It’s a hoot.

I can’t always round up wheel spinners tho. :thinking:

I did have a chance to ride it before it was slowed down and it was a more intense experience. They slowed it down not because of the Gs, but in hopes that a slower rotation would reduce the motion sickness issues.

Swirling saucers data should be interesting.

Brerbeer: I’ve only been to WDW once since Toy Story land opened and it was a trip with just my DW who even sits out Dumbo, so haven’t ridden that yet. This is a trip with just my DSDS24 who has looped Mission Space with me many times, so Swirling Saucers is on the touring plan. Didn’t think it would be much, but will quantify it.

I think it will be kind of neat to assign some kind of number to the “intensity” of roller coasters to give an idea of how someone timid might progress. I’d assume Barnstormer and Slinky would be the least, then up from there. Clearly way over-analyzing things, but still fun.

I had better make sure this data gathering works! Looks like more than just me is interested in the data.

will

Haven’t been on ASS yet, but I have been on Mater in DCS. Because you are constantly changing the direction of rotation, it’s much more of a lateral movement than a circular one.

Mater was a hoot!

So much fun!! For educational purposes you should re-ride in different seats: first row, last row and one in the middle. I’m wondering if the difference is that big.

Bswan26: RMS of x+y+z should catch the lateral G’s but still could break it out. I’ll have the raw data to play with.

dianelynn: Hoping so. With it being a perpetual CL1 the entire trip, hoping that looping in different positions is indeed possible. MK rides will be the most likely given we have 3 of 7 days there. Epcot and AK are my two one-day parks, so may not be able to loop rides in those parks much.

Data gathering begins Sept 16th at DHS.

will

2 Likes

All:

I’ve been back a week and still recovering from the trip (in a good way!!!). I have a LOT of raw data! I just posted my trip report, so over the next week or so will start cleaning up the logger data to be ready for posting.

Lots of fun insights I’m looking forward to sharing. The altimeter function was actually quite useful to look at too–especially on the dark roller coasters.

Back in a bit.

will

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Can’t wait to hear the results!

Now THIS is pulling Gs…

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This reminds me of the first few seconds on RnRC.

janamelia: I have the data coming! For RnR it’s just shy of 4G’s! Cool part is it three brief times in quick succession: launch, climbing the loop, then again at the bottom of the loop.

will

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I rarely notice the loops, I’m enjoying the ride so much.

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Ugh, formatting issues, trying again:

All:

OK here is a link to the all the files in a public Google Drive folder.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1daSlJ8oPCuiF0giErbiKIjsadsa_4V-6?usp=sharing

Directory structure:

  • Top level is by day which under COVID was clearly one park only per day.
  • For each day there are three folders:
    • CSV_Orig: Original files from the data logger (a few exceptions where is saved over the original)
    • CSV_Edited: CSV, but added total G’s and trimmed the file for just the ride.
    • XLSX: Trimmed for the rides and has major graphs of interest.

The original CSVs are just that, the raw data including time before getting on the ride as well as some time afterwards. Generally not more than a few minutes, but there were times I forgot for longer. One was over two hours! Oops! :slight_smile: This is also ALL files, whether I processed them or not. The safest from a security standpoint as they were generated by an embedded device that can’t have viruses
For the Edited CSV: At least one, usually a few for each ride if I did ride it more than once. These are edited for just the ride and have an added column for total G’s. When saved, however, the formula gets replaced by the actual value. CSVs are very safe to download, but are just the numbers. You can easily look at them with a text editor too.
The XLSX files have formulas and graphs for major parameters of interest. If you are concerned (or don’t trust your virus scanner), you may want to start with the edited CSVs and re-create your own graphs.

OK now for the fun part, observations that surprised me:

  • Rockin Rollercoaster:
    • Interesting that the G’s for the launch (1.6) pale compared to the loops (3.75).
    • The altimeter data shows clearly after the launch that the entire system is gravity fed, just like a normal coaster.
    • The two flat spots are the safety spots where they can stop passengers if there is an issue.
    • I’m sure there is useful information in the Gyro data, but can’t sort it out!
  • Tower of Terror:
    • Neat to see how quick and smooth the lift goes to the first two pre-shows
    • I created graphs just for the exiting part to look at that data more easily.
    • I always wondered if the elevator went below ground. It clearly doesn’t. Make sense, they’d have water issues!
    • Neat to see all four exit bottom, entrance next up, then two pre-shows.
    • I only got two data sets, took some smooth talking to get my son to ride twice, not is favorite.
  • Living With The Land:
    • Not even the bumps I remember at the end! Pretty much flatline except for probably me just shifting.
  • Mission Space
    • Wow, the data shows how smooth that ride really is!
    • Didn’t realize the Mars landing was not quite as strong as others
    • Gyro shows ~100,000 milli-degrees-per-second. By my math that comes to 16RPM.
    • They claim 2.5Gs if asked, I see about 2.25Gs.
  • Test Track:
    • Not as many G’s as I was expecting, 1.5 Max and that is likely vibration as much as anything
    • Would be good to work some smoothing functions on this to get rid of vibrations to see G’s going around the building
    • Clearly shows that the track is above the loading/unloading zones and show floor, etc.
  • Unknown (turns out to be Soarin)
    • This one flummoxed me for a while. Could not figure out what ride it was!
    • Altitude data confused me. I knew Soarin rose at the start of the show, but didn’t know it went up/down during the show!
    • It clearly does, so will be looking for this next time.
  • 7DMT:
    • Oscillations in the middle are me rocking the train car!
  • BTMR:
    • Neat to see the three inclines.
  • Goofy
    • Yep, it’s a short ride! :slight_smile:
  • Magic Carpets of Aladdin:
    • Only able to muster 1.2G’s by bouncing the vehicle
  • Space Mountain (left and right)
    • Very clearly shows it has just little dips and just generally goes down bit by bit
    • Kind of knew that, but really obvious on altitude data
    • Not big G’s and dips get close to 0G’s but very briefly.
    • Graph looks a lot smoother than I thought it would
    • This could use some more analysis for lateral G’s, etc.
  • Teacup Ride
    • For max dizziness, I like to spin one way, then the other, pretty obvious.
    • Jaggies are simply having to let go and reposition hands to go again
    • Maxed out at 200,000mdps or 33RPM. Not sure where we are compared to others.
  • DINASOUR:
    • Never realized it, but the loading zone is indeed below ground level! Rest of the ride at ground level.
    • Thinking about it makes sense, queue is at ground level, then decent to loading area
    • We get jerked around a lot, but not much in the way of G’s
  • Expedition Everest:
    • Very smooth!
    • Most G’s of any ride!\
    • Very surprised that the first dip is so shallow, feels like you drop a lot
    • Wonder if going backwards is what makes it feel like so much more?
    • Definitely know the near-0 G’s, that is where they take the picture.
  • Astro Orbiter:
    • Not much of note.
  • Alien Swirling Saucers:
    • Not a lot of total G’s even getting swung around
    • Gyro data shows best what is going on
  • Slinky Dog Dash:
    • Decent G’s for a kiddie ride! :slight_smile:
    • Like the up/down part toward the end of the ride.
  • Star Tours:
    • Took this data on a lark, not expecting much other than jerkiness
    • Very surprised to see how much the ride vehicle goes up and down as a whole

That is first round of notes and analysis! Feel free to download and play with the data if you are so inclined. I’ll keep tinkering with it too.

will

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Were you doing 2 hands together and moving both together? Interesting. I’ve found (I think) I can get it going faster by going hand over hand with one hand in common tact with the wheel at all times.

Heidelj:

Since my son and I are both turning, I can’ t quite do hand-over-hand or we’d get all twisted up. It is usually alternating push/pull depending on the side of the wheel. Looping Mission Space in the interest of more data gathering is OK, not sure I’d be up to looping the teacup ride 8x to try different strategies! :slight_smile: For other trips where my wife joins but sits out this ride, she claims we are usually among the faster spinners, so I assume we are doing reasonably well.

will

1 Like

:rofl: yeah, I did it a bunch of times with my kids because my wife refuses to ride the teacups! I definitely started feeling a little queasy, but luckily the kids decided it was enough before I had to quit.