Talk:Vortex (Kings Island)

Bat pieces

Two websites kicentral.com and kiextreme.com claim that parts of the Bat were reused to build Vortex, in particular the lift access stairs. KICentral claims "Some of the access stairs that were used on The Bat are now part of the Vortex and are used as the access stairs to the block brakes" while KIextreme claims "Sections of The Bat's lift hill stairs and brake run walkways were re-used on Vortex's lift hill and walkways. In fact, during Vortex's first season in 1987, they were still painted black." The two sites contradict each other as to the location of the reused stairs. Youtube videos, and a photo on KIextreme show that the tread of the stairs for the Bat were in fact yellow, not black. If anything was to be reused it makes no sense that it would not have been painted to match the new coaster, and if they weren't painted, the color listed on the one website is wrong. It also seems highly unlikely that stairs for a suspended coaster, which had to be hung from an overhead support, would work on a completely different style of coaster. The lift hill angle would had to have been precisely the same if they were reused on the lift hill. I also find it highly unlikely that as The Bat was being torn down for scrap metal, they were very careful to save just the stairs. It is more likely that any access stairs that are still visible are those in and around the station, not the lift hills and or block brakes and that over the years the story of the "access stairs" has been embellished. I think there are enough questions here to deem these sites unreliable for use as Wikipedia sources.JlACEer (talk) 13:52, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Good eye and nice find! Based on this information, I would agree that the statements are completely unreliable at this point. Kings Island's website is starting to post in-depth historical information on some of their rides such as The Beast. Perhaps when the Vortex is eventually covered (if it ever is), we'll know once and for all whether any part of that was true. —GoneIn60 (talk) 04:57, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Original colors

For as long as I can remember, the Vortex has always been a medium-to-dark blue with orange rails. I wasn't there the first year it opened, but I've been there every year since. The reason why the supports and track look blue-gray as opposed to a darker blue in some photos has to do with photodegradation or poor image quality to begin with. The best collection I can find that clearly shows the dark blue color is located here. Also if you look at the 1987 brochure, the color of the track in the drawing is pretty much royal blue - a far cry from blue-gray. —GoneIn60 (talk) 06:30, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I looked back through some old usenet discussion and I seem to be the only one who thinks it was gray. I was there the first year, but that was for too long long ago for me to have an accurate memory. One thing that made me curious was that some of the RCDB photos labelled as 1987 show some rust at the welding seems, particularly this one Ric Turner photo. That seems odd for a new coaster and it makes me wonder if it really is from 1987. Perhaps what I remember as gray was just faded blue, prior to getting a new coat of paint.JlACEer (talk) 13:21, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Previous tallest coaster

The article lists Viper at Darien Lake as the previous tallest full-circuit coaster, but I don't think it's right. I'm not sure but I think it may be Mindbender at Galaxyland.NemesisAT (talk) 22:12, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

NemesisAT: That's a good point. There are a lot of questionable records in coaster articles that haven't been properly sourced. Although my searches agree that Mindbender probably had the longest drop before Vortex, we should really only include it if an independent source confirms that. Also, it's important to distinguish between the overall height and drop length. Technically, Dragon Mountain at Marineland in Canada was taller than both coasters at 186 ft, though its drop was only 80 ft per coaster-net.com. --GoneIn60 (talk) 13:38, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, I'm doing some research on this for another wiki that I work on. Unfortunately the "source" on Mindbender was my own memory and looking through statistics on RCDB. Dragon Mountain is another coaster I looked at, I'm fairly certain 186 feet is the height difference, rather than height above ground, for this coaster as it hugs the ground for most of the course, and the lift is built on a hill. Again, I don't have any independent sources for it. I'll share what I find though, but it would probably be classed as "own research" and therefore not suitable for Wikipedia. NemesisAT (talk) 20:22, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Right, we consider height to be the highest point of the roller coaster that sits above the ground it was built on. Although Dragon Mountain hugs the terrain, that natural hill becomes the support structure, and is therefore factored into the overall height. The base of the roller coaster is where the lift hill begins and where the height is measured from, regardless if the lift hill's supports are man-made or not. It is still correct to say that Dragon Mountain is taller than both Mindbender and Vortex, despite the fact that some roller coaster buffs may place an asterisk next to that claim. The better alternative might be to remove that claim altogether from the "succession box", and instead focus on drop length for the succession order. Just my 2¢. --GoneIn60 (talk) 10:44, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

I was just writing on the Dragon Mountain page when you sent your message. You're right, it totally depends on how we measure the "height" of a roller coaster. In my opinion, the "height" is the highest point above ground, where the structure of the roller coaster itself is supporting the track (otherwise the High Roller at Stratosphere would be the tallest despite the roller coaster itself being really small). I'm currently working on a page here, which has seperate lists for "tallest", "tallest full-circuit" and "tallest drop". NemesisAT (talk) 11:01, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

The High Roller comparison is not apples-to-apples, because it doesn't have a lift hill going up the side of the building. Dragon Mountain is different, in that we are measuring from where the lift hill begins near the base of the hill, and not just the height of the hill it was built on. As for interpretations of what "height" really means, I get what you're saying, but we should look to reliable, secondary sources like RCDB to define this for us (at least here on Wikipedia). RCDB lists the height for Dragon Mountain but not for High Roller, and High Roller is nowhere to be found in its coaster records section. --GoneIn60 (talk) 11:40, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program course assignment

This article is the subject of an educational assignment at Ohio University supported by the Wikipedia Ambassador Program during the 2011 Q4 term. Further details are available on the course page.

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