A while ago I went to Terme 3000 in Slovenia, they had a looped style waterpark ride. Just as crazy as is looks, I guess the tilt angle prevents major injuries? Because that slide has been open for a long time. It took no effort to clear the loop as well.

Edit: For those curious, it's a pod-style release you can see on the image, the floor disappears under your feet. The green one next to it is one of the steepest in Europe IIRC.

[–] [email protected] 54 points 7 months ago (3 children)

I think it’s more to due to the radius.

It’s hard to tell the exact size from the picture, but the diameter of that loop seems to be at least several meters.

The one at action park was like 2 wide.

A bigger circle means less G forces while going around the loop, and less injuries. But action park rides were designed and built by the owner, who was not an engineer and apparently did not know any engineers. I’m pretty sure if you mentioned angular velocity to him, he’d just say that’s a sick name for a ride and then run away to get to a hardware store as fast as possible.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 7 months ago

Makes sense, it's more of a bobsled feeling than a loop feeling.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 7 months ago

The loop is also a circle, rather than the inverted teardrop shape (clothoid) it should have to spread those g-forces more evenly through the turn.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

This, but also, for the loop to work they have to be accelerating VERY fast into it. Look how steep the drop into is, compared to the angle of any of the slides in this photo. (Well, maybe not that green one back-right. That looks like one of those things where you slide down on your back on a hard sled and get a hundred feet of runway at the end.)

[–] [email protected] 14 points 7 months ago

In this one you aren't expected to be flipped upside down and then right side up in the span of 2 seconds. It's the loop diameter and the angle making this one safer.