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| Manufacturer | Premier Rides | |||||||||||||||||
| Product | Dueling Shuttle Catapult Coaster | |||||||||||||||||
| Designer / calculations | Ing.-Büro Stengel GmbH | |||||||||||||||||
| Type | Steel - Twin - Launched - Shuttle | |||||||||||||||||
| Riders per train | 20 | |||||||||||||||||
| Hourly capacity | 1360 | |||||||||||||||||
| Propulsion | LIM launch | |||||||||||||||||
| Batman (blue) |
Robin (red) | |||||||||||||||||
| Height | 200 feet | 200 feet | ||||||||||||||||
| Drop | 139 feet | 105 feet | ||||||||||||||||
| Speed | 65 mph | 65 mph | ||||||||||||||||
| Length | 1137 feet | 1229 feet | ||||||||||||||||
| Track inversions | 1 | 2 | ||||||||||||||||
| Rider inversions | 2 | 4 | ||||||||||||||||
| Drop angle | 90° | 90° | ||||||||||||||||
| Duration | 0:32 | 0:48 | ||||||||||||||||
| G-force | 5 | 5 | ||||||||||||||||
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Batman and Robin: The Chiller were a pair of steel launched shuttle roller coasters located at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson, New Jersey, USA. The roller coasters were built by Premier Rides and operated from 1997 to 2007, based on the Batman & Robin movie that came out the same year it opened, alongside Mr. Freeze: Reverse Blast at Six Flags Over Texas and a mirror image at Six Flags St. Louis.
History
In 1996, Six Flags Great Adventure announced that they would be adding a new roller coaster in 1997, bringing their coaster count back up to seven. It was then announced that the coaster would be a prototype LIM launched twin shuttle roller coaster dubbed Batman & Robin: The Chiller. The theme was chosen with the intent of promoting the Batman & Robin film, which was set to open in summer that year. The Observatory scenery piece, that eventually loomed over the launch tracks and exit ramp, was taken directly from the film source material, where it was home to Wayne Foundation's telescope integral to reversing Mr. Freeze's ice entombment of Gotham City. The queue and station played a variety of industrial noises, while Elliot Goldenthal's score played outside.
The ride debuted on June 7, 1997, with an opening ceremony where twins could ride; however, it was closed that same day, as it suffered numerous mechanical flaws. On April 4, 1998, the coaster officially opened to the public.
For the 2004 season, the LIMs were taken off the vertical rollbacks. In addition, the Batman side operated for a brief period of time, as it was closed for most of the season.
In 2005, The Chiller received upgrades. The interior was repainted red and the Batman side was repainted dark blue. The Robin side was still original. However, the Batman side did not operate at all as it suffered problems with the LIM motors on the vertical rollback.
During the 2007 season, the zero-g rolls were removed from the ride and replaced with banked hills. This reduced the amount of stalling in the rolls that put too much stress. Robin's hill was installed in March and Batman's in April. Batman's train was painted red so that Robin could use it, because Robin's train was damaged during a previous incident. The Robin side reopened on April 7th and ran until June 28th, when it was closed for the rest of the season as the coaster continued to suffer problems. The Batman side did not operate at all due to the damaged train, but three of the five cars from the original Robin train were placed on Batman's maintenance track. It was clear that The Chiller was far too difficult and expensive for the park to fix, so during the fall of 2007, Batman And Robin: The Chiller got removed from Six Flags Great Adventure along with the Movietown Water Effect and Stuntman's Freefall. All track and supports were removed, however the station, observatory scenery piece, and outdoor queue line were left remaining.[1]
After its closure, the ride was stored in a facility near the park. In 2012, it arrived at Beto Carrero World and has since been scrapped. The observatory scenery piece and station were reformatted to become the Xploratorium, and later, Justice League: Battle for Metropolis.
Design
| Elements |
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Batman:
Robin:
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The Chiller used an LIM launch system that propelled the trains from 0 to 65 mph in roughly 4 seconds. In the debut season, the ride originally ran dueling as intended for a short time. Due to the amount of power used by the LIMs straining the infrastructure with a duel launch, operations were changed so that a train could only be launched after the other train cleared the LIMs on the spike. Batman was launched into a 141 foot inverted top hat with a 139 foot drop. It then went through a banked inclined S-curve (formerly a zero-g roll) and then repeated the entire process in reverse. Robin had a similar track layout, except it had a 113 foot cobra roll with a 105 foot drop instead of a top hat (the largest of it's kind to date). Because of the differentiating heights in the main elements (and therefore the speed required to return through the course) Batman required 14 LIMs on the spike while Robin usually only needed 6 or 8.
Trains
2 trains with 5 cars per train. In each car, riders are arranged 2 across in 2 rows, for a total of 20 riders per train. One train per side. On opening, the trains had over-the-shoulder harnesses. These were replace with lap bars on the Robin side in September 2001 and on the Batman side in May 2002.[2]
Images
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References
- ↑ "Batman & Robin: Chiller Being Dismantled".
- ↑ "Batman & Robin: The Chiller". GreatAdventureHistory.
External links
- Batman And Robin: The Chiller on the Roller Coaster DataBase.
