As someone who rode both the original Gwazi tracks, this was an amazing analysis of the layout modifications that made me strangely nostalgic. Great job Ryan; onto 100K subs!
I know this is certainly the most "ground-up" of the RMC conversions, but was anyone else surprised to see just how much of the original Gwazi path(s) the IG conversion uses? I was under the impression that this was essentially a new ride which reused a few footers, at best. I'm even more impressed with RMC now that I see that they were working with such a restrictive template. It's like that game where someone gives you a paper with three squiggly lines and you have to make a picture out of it. Also, I totally agree with the assessment that IG is the "perfect amount of insanity." This is something RMC has really perfected. Iron Gwazi and Steel Vengeance are the only two roller coasters I've ever ridden where, every single ride, people are applauding when the train hits the brakes. Everyone, from enthusiasts to the average park-goer, loves these rides.
Just rode this for the first time today. Went to BGT a lot as a kid and got to experience Gwazi's launch weekend in 1999 as well as its gradual decline into a (quite literal) headache. Just have to say they did an astounding job with this ride. 10/10
It's frustrating that the park didn't create a dual-loading station for Iron Gwazi for 3 train operations, considering that Gwazi *already came with 2 stations!* This is an amazing rollercoaster at a large amusement park that operates year-round with large crowds, and yet they cheap'd out on their new headlining ride. This would greatly compensate for how long it usually takes to dispatch an RMC coaster's train, considering that they would almost always have a train ready to be dispatched when the lift hill block clears. 3 trains would *also* allow for the park to do maintenance on one train at a time in slower times of the year and still be able to continue 2 train operations and achieve a decent enough capacity. If I am correct and the park has no third train in reserve, then that will be really annoying when fall/winter comes around. Or, they could have a 4th train in reserve so that Iron Gwazi could *always* operate with 3 trains, but maybe that's overkill.
I rode this twice last week and back row is NUTS. Nonstop airtime, snappy transitions, intense elements. This is my favorite coaster I've ever ridden personally
I don't think that any enthusiast can dispute that RMC changed the whole game when it comes to rollercoasters. Talk about revolutionary. The heartline roll dive is similar to an element I made on a coaster in planet coaster, where it banks left, then does an upward heartline roll, right into an outer-banked airtime hill, then dives back down. Kind of the opposite here, but still an awesome element. Also, as a little cheat to avoid ever being stapled, lift yourself off the seat just a few inches, then use your legs and feet to push your back against the seat to keep yourself lifted above the bottom part of the seat enough to give some leeway, but not enough to where the operators might be able to tell, and let them push it down on your thighs. Once it dispatches and no one can see, let yourself sink back down, and BAM, you have tons of space to get lifted out of your seat and really enjoy the airtime these rides can give you. I did this with Twisted Timbers and it really improved my ride experience! Just stiffen your legs and don't go down into the seat until you are dispatched.
Gwazi was a great coaster in its early years. My family had season passes to BG tampa from 2000-03 and I got to ride Gwazi dozens of times in its glory days. It was not harsh at all in those years, and the dueling aspect was very thrilling. When I visited BG again in 2013 after 10 years, I was shocked at how terrible the Gwazi experience had become. It was past the realm of uncomfortable, it was downright painful to ride. I could also tell that it ran much slower than it used to.
Of all the videos covering the history of Gwazi/Iron Gwazi, I think this is by far the most enlightening. I feel like I don't REALLY understand a ride through and through until I hear Ryan talk about it. (Also, I'm utterly baffled to learn there are only 2-train ops so far. Given Busch Gardens' thin wallet as of late, I hope this is just temporary.)
@@FunkAndFluff I'm pretty late, but I work at iron gwazi! Having another train wouldn't help wait times. As it is, when one train dispatches, the other is already in the station, ready to pull in. Loading and unloading is already as efficient as it can be, and for it to be more efficient, every guest and attendant would have to be perfect- I've only seen one time where one train pulled out and another wasn't immediately there to replace it. Adding another train would just mean riders have to wait longer to get off the ride once it's over, which is frustrating. BG has three trains for the ride, but every supervisor I've talked to has told me they have never and won't ever run all three
I’m a Florida native, my first roller coaster I ever rode was Montu. As a near 2 decade long BG pass holder I got the chance to do an early ride of Iron Gwazi and I ran into a guy wearing a shirt with your spiel on block zones. It made me smile 🤣 I was like: “I know that line!”
I rode this on thanksgiving day 2022. Front row (which some of the people I was in line with called me crazy when I told them this was my first time on a coaster like this), at night (which wasn't exactly planned, I got in line at sunset but the coaster suffered a 30 or so minute delay). This was also my first coaster over 200 feet (only recently starting to get over my fear of coasters). I don't remember much of the experience, but I do remember letting out a loud scream at the drop. I'm glad I rode it, but I'm not sure I would do so again. This is now my tallest, fastest, and steepest coaster so far (record before this was Velocicoaster, which I think I prefer do to being able to ride it multiple times), and my first RMC coaster. Physically I felt fine afterwards, mentally I was both shocked and happy that I did it. Looks like I'm hitting the major leagues now :D
Judging from this episode, this is going to be a phenomenal series! I can't wait for more! Especially Velocicoaster's episode! P.S. I binge through your Problematic Roller Coaster playlist a lot. I never get tired of re-watching them!
Rode this coaster the year it opened with a 360min wait time. Worth every second of it. Both times i rode it thst day. Glad i was there all day and night for their late night halloween event lol.
I last rode Iron Gwazi less than 48 hours ago, I'm already hype to ride it again! I loved the analysis on capacity and what the ride would potentially be able to do on 3 trains! I agree that the time it takes for trains to park in the station takes FOREVER, it drives me crazy when I'm watching the trains park! One super fascinating thing about this is how they just took footers and layout from all over the place to make this new ride, just like you said that's incredibly impressive! This new series is fantastic and I'm looking forward to new videos in the future!
This is a banger video. The section where you went through the layout changes was a marathon, respect for having the attention span to actually figure that all out. I’d have given up after the first drop 😆
I had a feeling you were gonna use the station footage for this video. I was in shock the first time I saw how the ops worked for the ride and how long it took to load a train and send it. I can’t wait to ride it one day soon! Another great video mang!
Man was i a lucky duck to pick 2022 to go to busch gardens tampa then because wow for the summer of 22 to have that ride which i didn't know was new was cool
i got to ride iron gwazi over my spring break this year in late april and it was the best rollercoaster i’ve ever been on for sure. it had closed during the day when the wait time was posted at around 70 minutes, i checked the app the whole day waiting for it to reopen and when it finally did it had a 5 min wait. we rushed over to the coaster and only waited for about 10 min for a rollercoaster that was only a little over a month old at that point. the ride blew me away with the drop at the start and every time i came off the seat during the ride i got such a thrill. it’s probably my favorite ride of all time so far and i can’t wait to get the opportunity to ride it again.
I rode this for the first time on opening week and I’m literally just shocked at how amazing this ride is in every way. I’m such a huge fan on the relentless pacing, it’s what made this ride so amazing for me. This is a bucket list roller coaster everyone needs to experience. Currently sitting as my number one coaster ❤️
I rode Gwazi with my dad as a young teen during a family trip to Orlando and the surrounding region. I remember after the first ride, my dad's neck hurt and he didn't want to go on it again, saying it was rough. I, on the other hand, probably due to being around 13-14 years old, didn't really feel it that much, and I noticed there was no line to enter the coaster *at all*, so I rode it 7 times in a row, alternating between the tracks. Barely remember how the ride itself was, I do remember not enjoying it as much as the metal coasters around the park, but those had 1h+ lines attached to them, and that was enough to convince young me to go on another ride on the Gwazi.
I got on this beast last week. It's INCREDIBLE. Absolutely relentless and spends the entire ride trying it's absolute best to throw you out of your seat. I rode Velocicoaster in October and I've heard alot of debate between the two for the best coaster in Florida. My choice would be Velocicoaster. I'm not sure if I was judging it 100% on just the ride experience itself but I think I still would. The Velocicoaster experience is just amazing. The line was at the front of the queue when I rode and I waited only 30 minutes. So much to see while waiting and the operations are incredible. Seriously the crews working that ride deserve an award. They somehow manage to be incredibly fast, helpful, informative, take row requests, and on top of all of that seemed like they were having a blast working there. Of all the memorable things that happen on that ride, the ride crew is immediately what I think about first when recounting it.
Excellent video Ryan! Appreciated the look at re-use of supports in the engineering. I'm glad you addressed the programming....it was so frustrating to watch the trains advance so slowly and the restraint unlock happen so long after the train park....which could so easily be resolved with adjustments on the location of the station wait, drive tire speeds, multi-move logic, etc in the programming (someone get IOE in there!). Hopefully they can improve the platform operations as well so that more people can experience this great ride!
Me and the kids queued up before opening so we could ride this first thing (we'd done all the coasters the day before). I think we were the 2nd train out that day. Awesome experience. By the time we got off, the wait time was already an hour long.
This is barely an RMC retrack and straight up an RMC roller coaster. I love how massive and clean the steel lift hill and how it dives down to a tangled mess of wood underneath.
Why did I not know about this series before?! Have been craving more long-form content from your channel and only knew about the "Problematic" series :/
I wish it was your job to ensure that all the top rides run at max efficiency!! Great videos! So informative and so much work and research goes into these.
Being as Busch Gardens is my home park, you demonstrated an impressive amount of history on Gwazi. Ive ridden the original Gwazi more times than I can count, including a 6 lap back to back run that proved to be painful, but Iron Gwazi blows it out of the water! I hope to finally make it up to Cedar Point at some point, but as of right now this is my favorite coaster to date! Awesome video! The only thing Busch Gardens needs now is a giga/strata coaster!
Gwazi was my first big roller coaster back in 2011. It was uncomfortable and rough, but I was happy I managed to go on it. Last week I've ridden Iron Gwazi. It was my 100 coaster credit, and it became the #1 roller coaster in my rankings. It is, indeed, a marvelous ride! Great analysis as always, Ryan!
i have annual passes and got to ride march 10, a day before grand opening. the ride truly tears through the landscape, it's more intense than any of the other rides at busch gardens easily. without tall headrests and with only a small lap bar, you feel perfectly exposed. one of the only rides where i prefer front seat. it was such an amazing experience to be able to ride over and over again
This video answers a question I had about RMCs in general: to what extent is the "conversion" aspect of these hybrid conversions just a marketing gimmick for what is essentially a ground-up new coaster? It seems as if on many of these rides, they don't actually use that large a fraction of the original wood, but they do use the *footers*, which is genuinely an economizing move. And they used a lot of the footers even on Iron Gwazi, though not in anything like the way the original ride did, often switching between the original paths and taking them in the opposite direction. Thanks for this great, exhaustive analysis.
IMHO, the hybrid wood coasters are simply the best in the business right now. Twisted Colossus at Six Flags is my all-time favorite. Awesome video, you obviously put a lot of time and effort into this.
I like how you touched on operations here. While RMC is nearly perfect in terms of layout quality & build quality (new Intamins & B&Ms STILL develop a rattle some of the time), they are they are embarrassingly flawed when it comes to operations. Out of all the major ride manufacturers they have the trains that take the longest to check & are the most sensitive to rider weight. Given the six car trains they also don't have the inherent rider capacity of anything B&M. Lastly, unless I am mistaken, Steel Vengance is their only ride with a MCBR or even 2 block zones before the station to allow for 3 car operations. Compile this with the fact that parks rarely seem to value or achieve fast operations anymore, RMCs are a capacity nightmare. They really need to work on this, easily their biggest issue with new installations and the line at Steel Vengance & Iron Gwazi are already infamous for hour plus lines.
New Texas Giant also has a MCBR and has 3 trains, but on my visit, and from what I hear they only ever run 2. A lot of these RMCs aren't capable of getting 1,000 guests an hour which I think is a good number for a line to move pretty quickly.
@@jricedrums Yep, I live in Arlington, and I've never seen NTG operate with three trains. They tried a moving station approach for a few months, but dropped that after the accident, as having to rush loading was found to be a contributing cause. (The operations issues are why CF have said they'll never work with RMC again.)
@@cynicanal111 I'm pretty sure they ran all 3 trains in 2011. I remember noting how quickly the line moved and how fast they dispatched trains back then. Obviously, this was before the trains had seatbelts, so that may have been it. Also, I'm pretty sure the moving station procedure was dropped before the accident.
I haven't finished watching this yet (dinner and all that), but I wanted to say up until this video, I never truly considered GwaGwa to be a true conversion, BUT thanks to your walkthrough Ryan, I am fully on board with calling this a true conversion. Great video so far, mang.
As awesome as Iron Gwazi looks (I haven’t ridden it yet) it still annoys me that they themed it to a alligator instead of the lion and tiger. This would have been a great opportunity to have two different color sets of rails like Joker and Aerie Force One.
It’s themed to a crocodile, which is an African animal lol. Plus we wouldn’t have the death roll if it was themed to that. I think it’s a good change personally.
This was a awesome video detailing how Iron Gwazi came to be. I've ridden Iron Gwazi close to 40 times now and have never had a bad ride on it yet. It is a true coaster masterpiece.
It’s awesome that every video you quickly give the knowledge about block zones, it’s not a video of yours otherwise. That’s what made me sub to your channel long ago-you provide useful, accurate knowledge about something I’m interested in. I remember coming across a video of yours like hey I’ve heard about block zones before-then you explained them. Honestly it’s probably why we all subbed. Great video
I rode Gwazi on a highschool field trip in 2005 and it was by far my favorite coaster. I came back in 2014 and rode it again. This time it was so rough I had to go to the first aid station because it gave me a severe head ache.
Wow, what a great technical review of the ride, especially throughput discussion. I did not expect that, but I LOVE it. Regarding ride dynamics, it will kick your azz.
I went for previews in early March and was my first ever visit to BGT and Iron Gwazi instantly became my number one coaster, beating my previous leader Twisted Colossus and even Steel Vengeance. This coaster is balls to the wall action from drop to brakes without a single dull moment during the entire layout. This is easily the greatest coaster ride experience in the country and it’s not even close to my second. When I ride Velocicoaster next month however, that will be the true test of this absolute beast.
@@anobject9622 I fully expected Velocicoaster to be the winner, but Gwazi is still my favorite overall, and Velocicoaster is a solid second place until I ride it again. Very tough to choose between the two but they are obviously very different rides
Iron Gwazi is one of my favorite rides, but has the weakest ending of any RMC I’ve been on. After the zero g stall the ride is just meh. A very anti climatic ending for such an incredible ride. 🎢
I was down in Tampa at the end of March and noted the same thing with the programing. Grant it, on a Tuesday and Wednesday, they only had two ride ops running the platform, but I felt the programing really hindered the throughput. Even when the crew nailed dispatch, the train is completely out of the station before the next train starts moving, so with the curve into the station between the blocks, just an insane amount of wasted time in the programing. I thought three trains would be possible by fixing the programing alone, didn't even consider the slow down at the top of the hill. Nice job. Here is an idea, maybe a video looking at the cost of thrills; money spent, throughput, experience. Basically, RMC's deliver amazing airtime, but at what cost? Mako is amazing as well and will deliver way more riders per year but not as intense as Iron Gwazi. And as you said, Velocicoaster is killing it with throughput. I love Iron Gwazi, top 3 for sure, maybe number 1, but I will take 15 rides in one day on Mako over 3 rides in one day on Iron Gwazi, and throughput dictates that. Are there any RMC's delivering over 1,000 pph?? 1,200??? As always, amazing work brother!!!
was able to go to Florida a few weeks ago to ride this and VelociCoaster. Both are brilliant rides, easily top 5. I think i give the edge slightly to Velocicoaster, but both are fantastic. The Universal-Tampa trip is a must for any enthusiast.
Watched so many POVs/Vlogs of this coaster where the excitement just hums off my screen that it is truly a pleasure to now get a proper deep-dive like this. The creativity of the design given the existing foundations is just incredible, and your analysis gives me such a better understanding of the genius involved in bringing it to life. Beautiful work man - thanks!
Christ on a bike, this gets better with every viewing! There is no realistic chance of English me riding this for at least 5 years, given my current circs, but I am vicariously living the dream through your incredible conjuring of this ride in my mind's eye, and that'll do until the day I do ride! Does that even make sense?
I rode it three times in May. first time was in the front. it's easily my No. 1 coaster. while I have been on every Coaster at Cedar Point, but Steel Vengeance, I do not have that comparison to make. the ride is amazing! it absolutely blows your mind!
Having grown up going to this park, and riding Gwazi for most of it, I can say this is now among my favorite coasters in the park. Only ride to come close for me is Montu, and that's more because of the terrific turnaround on that ride (I almost never wait more than five minutes, if that, to ride). Gwazi will still have problems with that for a good long time.
this ride is absolutely insane. front row early in the morning is crazy but then going to riding this thing at night in the back row is like riding a whole different ride
I rode this coaster during spring break, hands down the best coaster ever, it was so crazy I forgot what happened after. Can’t wait to compare it to Steve when I ride it this summer
this looks so cool! thanks for making this video. hopefully i can get my family to travel to Florida for this. we used to go on road trips all the time. stopped for various reasons in the past half decade, and this might be a good motivator to start again
About the steel supports. In a IG media day interview with Jake Killcup, he said something about extra reinforcement as Hurricane bracing. Chances are the steel beams are the hurricane bracing.
Really dig this video. It had answers to questions I wasn’t even sure I had, but in the back of my mind definitely wanted to know. Keep it up mang! Can’t wait for the next in this series!
I’d love to see one in this series about some of KI’s newest coasters. All 4 of the newest coasters run consistently at pretty high capacities, and the newest 3 are pretty advanced for their model types.
Awesome vid! I like the concept of some videos being purely about how neat a coaster is, and not necessarily equating complicated=problematic. I look forward to more of these and of course the classic problematic vids.
Busch Gardens Tampa has amazing coasters and I'm glad the Iron Gwazi is helping bring people to the park to ride them. Even Scorpion was a quick fun ride when I was there this weekend. The only coaster I don't care for is Tigris
I got to ride Iron Gwazi 5 times when I went to Florida a few weeks back, and honestly it made my #2 coaster of all time, which pushed down Twisted Colossus. What surprised me the most was the insane amount of speed, I had gone into it thinking it would be similar to Twisted Colossus and was greatly surprised. My favorite element is the death roll.
iron gawazi is my favorite ride. i love all of the features that iron gawazi brings to the table. it is so much better than the original gawazi, i am so glad they upgraded gawazi into iron gawazi
Another Great video. I don't even ride Rollercoasters anymore. But love your detailed breakdowns and walk throughs. Should do a big hard cover coffee table book of Rollercoasters. 😁 I'm really looking forward to Ghostrider. I lived close to Knotts growing up in the early 80's with Corkscrew and Mantazumas and until I moved away late 90's just before Ghostrider started going up. Will be awesome to hear all about it.
Busch Gardens is 10 min away from my house. I think the twist and shot is my favorite element on Iron Gwazi, Mainly because i keep my hands up for the duration of the coaster and the way the twist and shout dives under the lift hill gives some great head chopper feels.
Love the video! I found the theoretical 3 train capacity overview super fascinating, and learned a bit more about how programming can change a coaster so dramatically. Looking forward to more content!
Just off our 2nd ride, definitely faster than our first ride at start of day. I rank it #3 for me personally, but not better than SteVe and Voyage. It's woefully short.
Im doing a 2 week rollercoaster roadtrip Sfga Luna park Sfne Sf great escape Sf darien lake Waldaamer Cedar point Kings island Kennywood Idlewild Lakemont park Hersheypark Dorney park Knoebels And the fact I have so mang of these videos to follow up on... Im happy. Thank you for your great content.
Me and my company did alot of the metal work for the ride and station. It was such an awesome experience to be on the other side of waiting for a ride to open
Outstanding video. I especially appreciate the discussion of operations and suggestions for how to improve them. I'm really disappointed to see how little effort seems to go into designing rides with high capacity in mind. Of course, it will cost the park more; and unless there is sufficient pressure from consumers, parks are incentivized to cheap out on the ride and then sell guests the "solution" to the inevitable long lines via skip-the-line passes, which then makes the standby line even slower. It's a real pain point at my home park SFOT, and I actually go there less often than I otherwise would due to the absurdly slow lines Giant gets. By contrast, Universal really knocked it out of the park with regard to capacity on Velocicoaster. That line MOVES.
Great Episode of the Theme Park Marvels! Iron Gwazi is a great roller coaster! And I'm glad everybody in the coaster community had a fun time riding on this coaster! It's also a improvement to the original Gwazi that use to operated before they torn it down. It's a fun RMC I-box for a roller coaster!
I have been on it. The bounce of wood but smooth steel ride. And you really don't know what to expect to happen next, not as predictable as an old out & back.
Rode it a few weeks ago, this and Steel Vengeance are my favorite, both totally different experiences, completely insane. So fast, mind bending, out of control feeling, so many mis directions.
Love this channel with the reviews and tech of a Rollercoaster. The last time I was to this park Gwazi was dueling. It was a cool experience. The first time I visited this park crocodiles were in Montu's first turn to the lift and the MCBR were not on. I'm hoping to get back to this park soon as Steel Vengeance is my #1. to see if this takes it down.
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
Welp, I’ve been pronouncing Gwazi wrong my whole life, sorry guys! I’m more of a math person and my linguistic skills can suffer sometimes 😂
Wait then how do you say it
I thought it as gwa-Z
@@landinursem2446 You are right
@@PcPilot82 I think OP is referring to his repeatedly saying "gu-wah-zee" with an extra syllable at the front rather than the two syllanble "gwa-zee"
I came here to say this 😅 such a weird pronunciation lol
Ryan: "Maybe I'll talk a little bit about its block zones"
Everyone: "He's DEFINITELY going to talk about block zones"
I was waiting in line for Iron Gwazi and I saw a guy wearing a tshirt that was the block zone explanation from this channel. 😂
Velocicoaster blew my mind. Iron Gwazi took my breath away.
dude's just casually dropping 40 minute long video essays onto the tubes
Straight up
As someone who rode both the original Gwazi tracks, this was an amazing analysis of the layout modifications that made me strangely nostalgic. Great job Ryan; onto 100K subs!
Same, I was SO happy that the new version really kept the spirit of the old one.
The last time I rode the original gwazi was 2010 and it was pretty rough.
I was fortunate enough to ride this last week, and "relentless" truly is the best way to describe it. Absolute top-tier coaster.
Rode it last week and the week before and have to agree, probably my top coaster thus far.
In rode this today, absolutely awesome.
I know this is certainly the most "ground-up" of the RMC conversions, but was anyone else surprised to see just how much of the original Gwazi path(s) the IG conversion uses? I was under the impression that this was essentially a new ride which reused a few footers, at best. I'm even more impressed with RMC now that I see that they were working with such a restrictive template. It's like that game where someone gives you a paper with three squiggly lines and you have to make a picture out of it.
Also, I totally agree with the assessment that IG is the "perfect amount of insanity." This is something RMC has really perfected. Iron Gwazi and Steel Vengeance are the only two roller coasters I've ever ridden where, every single ride, people are applauding when the train hits the brakes. Everyone, from enthusiasts to the average park-goer, loves these rides.
I agree RMC (rules!) started a New Concept in roller coaster design and now their competitors are mimicking their own steel box track.
Iron Gwazi is an engineering marvel of an RMC hybrid coaster~ And it's so refreshing to hear this from an engineer like Ryan is :)
Just rode this for the first time today. Went to BGT a lot as a kid and got to experience Gwazi's launch weekend in 1999 as well as its gradual decline into a (quite literal) headache. Just have to say they did an astounding job with this ride. 10/10
It's frustrating that the park didn't create a dual-loading station for Iron Gwazi for 3 train operations, considering that Gwazi *already came with 2 stations!* This is an amazing rollercoaster at a large amusement park that operates year-round with large crowds, and yet they cheap'd out on their new headlining ride. This would greatly compensate for how long it usually takes to dispatch an RMC coaster's train, considering that they would almost always have a train ready to be dispatched when the lift hill block clears.
3 trains would *also* allow for the park to do maintenance on one train at a time in slower times of the year and still be able to continue 2 train operations and achieve a decent enough capacity. If I am correct and the park has no third train in reserve, then that will be really annoying when fall/winter comes around. Or, they could have a 4th train in reserve so that Iron Gwazi could *always* operate with 3 trains, but maybe that's overkill.
A dual loading station would’ve been awesome. Great point!
If it’s true about struggling to pay the 9 million then another 1-3 million for dual loading and extra trains is not feasible.
the only problem here would be the amount of people required to do this, and i'm sure it'd cost a lot to essentially have double the ops
I rode this twice last week and back row is NUTS. Nonstop airtime, snappy transitions, intense elements. This is my favorite coaster I've ever ridden personally
I don't think that any enthusiast can dispute that RMC changed the whole game when it comes to rollercoasters. Talk about revolutionary. The heartline roll dive is similar to an element I made on a coaster in planet coaster, where it banks left, then does an upward heartline roll, right into an outer-banked airtime hill, then dives back down. Kind of the opposite here, but still an awesome element.
Also, as a little cheat to avoid ever being stapled, lift yourself off the seat just a few inches, then use your legs and feet to push your back against the seat to keep yourself lifted above the bottom part of the seat enough to give some leeway, but not enough to where the operators might be able to tell, and let them push it down on your thighs. Once it dispatches and no one can see, let yourself sink back down, and BAM, you have tons of space to get lifted out of your seat and really enjoy the airtime these rides can give you. I did this with Twisted Timbers and it really improved my ride experience! Just stiffen your legs and don't go down into the seat until you are dispatched.
Gwazi was a great coaster in its early years. My family had season passes to BG tampa from 2000-03 and I got to ride Gwazi dozens of times in its glory days. It was not harsh at all in those years, and the dueling aspect was very thrilling. When I visited BG again in 2013 after 10 years, I was shocked at how terrible the Gwazi experience had become. It was past the realm of uncomfortable, it was downright painful to ride. I could also tell that it ran much slower than it used to.
Of all the videos covering the history of Gwazi/Iron Gwazi, I think this is by far the most enlightening. I feel like I don't REALLY understand a ride through and through until I hear Ryan talk about it.
(Also, I'm utterly baffled to learn there are only 2-train ops so far. Given Busch Gardens' thin wallet as of late, I hope this is just temporary.)
Can you imagine a collab between Ryan and amusement labs!!! That would seriously slap!
this ride cant operate with three trains ever
@@NickyD Because?
i just barely went and rode gwazi twice and even with only two trains the wait was no longer than 40 minutes
@@FunkAndFluff I'm pretty late, but I work at iron gwazi!
Having another train wouldn't help wait times. As it is, when one train dispatches, the other is already in the station, ready to pull in. Loading and unloading is already as efficient as it can be, and for it to be more efficient, every guest and attendant would have to be perfect- I've only seen one time where one train pulled out and another wasn't immediately there to replace it. Adding another train would just mean riders have to wait longer to get off the ride once it's over, which is frustrating. BG has three trains for the ride, but every supervisor I've talked to has told me they have never and won't ever run all three
I’m a Florida native, my first roller coaster I ever rode was Montu. As a near 2 decade long BG pass holder I got the chance to do an early ride of Iron Gwazi and I ran into a guy wearing a shirt with your spiel on block zones. It made me smile 🤣
I was like: “I know that line!”
I rode this on thanksgiving day 2022. Front row (which some of the people I was in line with called me crazy when I told them this was my first time on a coaster like this), at night (which wasn't exactly planned, I got in line at sunset but the coaster suffered a 30 or so minute delay). This was also my first coaster over 200 feet (only recently starting to get over my fear of coasters). I don't remember much of the experience, but I do remember letting out a loud scream at the drop. I'm glad I rode it, but I'm not sure I would do so again. This is now my tallest, fastest, and steepest coaster so far (record before this was Velocicoaster, which I think I prefer do to being able to ride it multiple times), and my first RMC coaster. Physically I felt fine afterwards, mentally I was both shocked and happy that I did it. Looks like I'm hitting the major leagues now :D
Judging from this episode, this is going to be a phenomenal series! I can't wait for more! Especially Velocicoaster's episode! P.S. I binge through your Problematic Roller Coaster playlist a lot. I never get tired of re-watching them!
Rode this coaster the year it opened with a 360min wait time. Worth every second of it. Both times i rode it thst day. Glad i was there all day and night for their late night halloween event lol.
I last rode Iron Gwazi less than 48 hours ago, I'm already hype to ride it again! I loved the analysis on capacity and what the ride would potentially be able to do on 3 trains! I agree that the time it takes for trains to park in the station takes FOREVER, it drives me crazy when I'm watching the trains park! One super fascinating thing about this is how they just took footers and layout from all over the place to make this new ride, just like you said that's incredibly impressive! This new series is fantastic and I'm looking forward to new videos in the future!
no chance it does three trains
This is a banger video. The section where you went through the layout changes was a marathon, respect for having the attention span to actually figure that all out. I’d have given up after the first drop 😆
I had a feeling you were gonna use the station footage for this video. I was in shock the first time I saw how the ops worked for the ride and how long it took to load a train and send it. I can’t wait to ride it one day soon! Another great video mang!
Man was i a lucky duck to pick 2022 to go to busch gardens tampa then because wow for the summer of 22 to have that ride which i didn't know was new was cool
Gwazi is probably the best all rounder. It's a jack of all trades, yet it works for it
i got to ride iron gwazi over my spring break this year in late april and it was the best rollercoaster i’ve ever been on for sure. it had closed during the day when the wait time was posted at around 70 minutes, i checked the app the whole day waiting for it to reopen and when it finally did it had a 5 min wait. we rushed over to the coaster and only waited for about 10 min for a rollercoaster that was only a little over a month old at that point.
the ride blew me away with the drop at the start and every time i came off the seat during the ride i got such a thrill. it’s probably my favorite ride of all time so far and i can’t wait to get the opportunity to ride it again.
I rode this for the first time on opening week and I’m literally just shocked at how amazing this ride is in every way. I’m such a huge fan on the relentless pacing, it’s what made this ride so amazing for me. This is a bucket list roller coaster everyone needs to experience. Currently sitting as my number one coaster ❤️
I rode Gwazi with my dad as a young teen during a family trip to Orlando and the surrounding region. I remember after the first ride, my dad's neck hurt and he didn't want to go on it again, saying it was rough. I, on the other hand, probably due to being around 13-14 years old, didn't really feel it that much, and I noticed there was no line to enter the coaster *at all*, so I rode it 7 times in a row, alternating between the tracks. Barely remember how the ride itself was, I do remember not enjoying it as much as the metal coasters around the park, but those had 1h+ lines attached to them, and that was enough to convince young me to go on another ride on the Gwazi.
I got on this beast last week. It's INCREDIBLE. Absolutely relentless and spends the entire ride trying it's absolute best to throw you out of your seat. I rode Velocicoaster in October and I've heard alot of debate between the two for the best coaster in Florida. My choice would be Velocicoaster. I'm not sure if I was judging it 100% on just the ride experience itself but I think I still would. The Velocicoaster experience is just amazing. The line was at the front of the queue when I rode and I waited only 30 minutes. So much to see while waiting and the operations are incredible. Seriously the crews working that ride deserve an award. They somehow manage to be incredibly fast, helpful, informative, take row requests, and on top of all of that seemed like they were having a blast working there. Of all the memorable things that happen on that ride, the ride crew is immediately what I think about first when recounting it.
Excellent video Ryan! Appreciated the look at re-use of supports in the engineering. I'm glad you addressed the programming....it was so frustrating to watch the trains advance so slowly and the restraint unlock happen so long after the train park....which could so easily be resolved with adjustments on the location of the station wait, drive tire speeds, multi-move logic, etc in the programming (someone get IOE in there!). Hopefully they can improve the platform operations as well so that more people can experience this great ride!
Me and the kids queued up before opening so we could ride this first thing (we'd done all the coasters the day before). I think we were the 2nd train out that day. Awesome experience. By the time we got off, the wait time was already an hour long.
“The train is quickly dispatched from the statio-“
Let me stop you there bud.
I had no idea it reused the structures like that. That makes it far cooler.
This is barely an RMC retrack and straight up an RMC roller coaster. I love how massive and clean the steel lift hill and how it dives down to a tangled mess of wood underneath.
Why did I not know about this series before?! Have been craving more long-form content from your channel and only knew about the "Problematic" series :/
The section on how Iron Gwazi used different sections of the Lion and Tiger sides of the old Gwazi was really interesting. Great job on that.
i really enjoyed this video! hoping for more of this series
I wish it was your job to ensure that all the top rides run at max efficiency!! Great videos! So informative and so much work and research goes into these.
Being as Busch Gardens is my home park, you demonstrated an impressive amount of history on Gwazi. Ive ridden the original Gwazi more times than I can count, including a 6 lap back to back run that proved to be painful, but Iron Gwazi blows it out of the water! I hope to finally make it up to Cedar Point at some point, but as of right now this is my favorite coaster to date! Awesome video! The only thing Busch Gardens needs now is a giga/strata coaster!
Gwazi was my first big roller coaster back in 2011. It was uncomfortable and rough, but I was happy I managed to go on it.
Last week I've ridden Iron Gwazi. It was my 100 coaster credit, and it became the #1 roller coaster in my rankings. It is, indeed, a marvelous ride! Great analysis as always, Ryan!
i have annual passes and got to ride march 10, a day before grand opening. the ride truly tears through the landscape, it's more intense than any of the other rides at busch gardens easily. without tall headrests and with only a small lap bar, you feel perfectly exposed. one of the only rides where i prefer front seat. it was such an amazing experience to be able to ride over and over again
really enjoyed the first episode in the series, can't tell you how much i'm looking forward to the next! thanks for the high quality content ryan!
This video answers a question I had about RMCs in general: to what extent is the "conversion" aspect of these hybrid conversions just a marketing gimmick for what is essentially a ground-up new coaster? It seems as if on many of these rides, they don't actually use that large a fraction of the original wood, but they do use the *footers*, which is genuinely an economizing move. And they used a lot of the footers even on Iron Gwazi, though not in anything like the way the original ride did, often switching between the original paths and taking them in the opposite direction.
Thanks for this great, exhaustive analysis.
I think ryan addresses this sufficiently in the video
This is now the tallest coaster I’ve been on at a grand 1ft taller than stealth at thorpe park 😂
IMHO, the hybrid wood coasters are simply the best in the business right now. Twisted Colossus at Six Flags is my all-time favorite. Awesome video, you obviously put a lot of time and effort into this.
I like how you touched on operations here. While RMC is nearly perfect in terms of layout quality & build quality (new Intamins & B&Ms STILL develop a rattle some of the time), they are they are embarrassingly flawed when it comes to operations. Out of all the major ride manufacturers they have the trains that take the longest to check & are the most sensitive to rider weight. Given the six car trains they also don't have the inherent rider capacity of anything B&M. Lastly, unless I am mistaken, Steel Vengance is their only ride with a MCBR or even 2 block zones before the station to allow for 3 car operations. Compile this with the fact that parks rarely seem to value or achieve fast operations anymore, RMCs are a capacity nightmare. They really need to work on this, easily their biggest issue with new installations and the line at Steel Vengance & Iron Gwazi are already infamous for hour plus lines.
New Texas Giant also has a MCBR and has 3 trains, but on my visit, and from what I hear they only ever run 2. A lot of these RMCs aren't capable of getting 1,000 guests an hour which I think is a good number for a line to move pretty quickly.
@@jricedrums Yep, I live in Arlington, and I've never seen NTG operate with three trains. They tried a moving station approach for a few months, but dropped that after the accident, as having to rush loading was found to be a contributing cause.
(The operations issues are why CF have said they'll never work with RMC again.)
@@cynicanal111 I'm pretty sure they ran all 3 trains in 2011. I remember noting how quickly the line moved and how fast they dispatched trains back then. Obviously, this was before the trains had seatbelts, so that may have been it. Also, I'm pretty sure the moving station procedure was dropped before the accident.
I haven't finished watching this yet (dinner and all that), but I wanted to say up until this video, I never truly considered GwaGwa to be a true conversion, BUT thanks to your walkthrough Ryan, I am fully on board with calling this a true conversion. Great video so far, mang.
Just rode this today for the first time and came back to watch this again. Wow. What a ride. My first RMC and I will never forget it!
As awesome as Iron Gwazi looks (I haven’t ridden it yet) it still annoys me that they themed it to a alligator instead of the lion and tiger. This would have been a great opportunity to have two different color sets of rails like Joker and Aerie Force One.
It’s themed to a crocodile, which is an African animal lol. Plus we wouldn’t have the death roll if it was themed to that. I think it’s a good change personally.
This was a awesome video detailing how Iron Gwazi came to be. I've ridden Iron Gwazi close to 40 times now and have never had a bad ride on it yet. It is a true coaster masterpiece.
It’s awesome that every video you quickly give the knowledge about block zones, it’s not a video of yours otherwise.
That’s what made me sub to your channel long ago-you provide useful, accurate knowledge about something I’m interested in.
I remember coming across a video of yours like hey I’ve heard about block zones before-then you explained them. Honestly it’s probably why we all subbed.
Great video
I rode Gwazi on a highschool field trip in 2005 and it was by far my favorite coaster. I came back in 2014 and rode it again. This time it was so rough I had to go to the first aid station because it gave me a severe head ache.
Call the whambulance.
Wow, what a great technical review of the ride, especially throughput discussion. I did not expect that, but I LOVE it. Regarding ride dynamics, it will kick your azz.
This is the greatest coaster video I've ever seen
this just got me so hype !! Two awesome series to look forward too !!
I went for previews in early March and was my first ever visit to BGT and Iron Gwazi instantly became my number one coaster, beating my previous leader Twisted Colossus and even Steel Vengeance. This coaster is balls to the wall action from drop to brakes without a single dull moment during the entire layout. This is easily the greatest coaster ride experience in the country and it’s not even close to my second. When I ride Velocicoaster next month however, that will be the true test of this absolute beast.
is it better or worse than velocicoaster?
@@anobject9622 I fully expected Velocicoaster to be the winner, but Gwazi is still my favorite overall, and Velocicoaster is a solid second place until I ride it again. Very tough to choose between the two but they are obviously very different rides
Iron Gwazi is one of my favorite rides, but has the weakest ending of any RMC I’ve been on. After the zero g stall the ride is just meh. A very anti climatic ending for such an incredible ride. 🎢
I was down in Tampa at the end of March and noted the same thing with the programing. Grant it, on a Tuesday and Wednesday, they only had two ride ops running the platform, but I felt the programing really hindered the throughput. Even when the crew nailed dispatch, the train is completely out of the station before the next train starts moving, so with the curve into the station between the blocks, just an insane amount of wasted time in the programing. I thought three trains would be possible by fixing the programing alone, didn't even consider the slow down at the top of the hill. Nice job.
Here is an idea, maybe a video looking at the cost of thrills; money spent, throughput, experience. Basically, RMC's deliver amazing airtime, but at what cost? Mako is amazing as well and will deliver way more riders per year but not as intense as Iron Gwazi. And as you said, Velocicoaster is killing it with throughput. I love Iron Gwazi, top 3 for sure, maybe number 1, but I will take 15 rides in one day on Mako over 3 rides in one day on Iron Gwazi, and throughput dictates that. Are there any RMC's delivering over 1,000 pph?? 1,200??? As always, amazing work brother!!!
was able to go to Florida a few weeks ago to ride this and VelociCoaster. Both are brilliant rides, easily top 5. I think i give the edge slightly to Velocicoaster, but both are fantastic. The Universal-Tampa trip is a must for any enthusiast.
Same here, but im team gwazi 😎
I almost wish they had "just" done a 1:1 conversion of the original so we could enjoy the duelling layout again. But this is amazing, too!
The purple track is stunning. 🤌
Great video. 3 train operations would shorten the steel track service life by 33% so maybe BGT wants the track to last longer
Your videos are always so thorough! Love it.
Been so busy with the move into the house, I missed this video! Glad you could put all my old footage to good use!
Watched so many POVs/Vlogs of this coaster where the excitement just hums off my screen that it is truly a pleasure to now get a proper deep-dive like this. The creativity of the design given the existing foundations is just incredible, and your analysis gives me such a better understanding of the genius involved in bringing it to life. Beautiful work man - thanks!
Christ on a bike, this gets better with every viewing! There is no realistic chance of English me riding this for at least 5 years, given my current circs, but I am vicariously living the dream through your incredible conjuring of this ride in my mind's eye, and that'll do until the day I do ride! Does that even make sense?
This is great! Love seeing projects about my number one coaster.
Can’t wait for Velocicoaster video. Also as a frequent visitor of Silver Dollar City I appreciated the Outlaw Run shout
I rode it three times in May. first time was in the front. it's easily my No. 1 coaster. while I have been on every Coaster at Cedar Point, but Steel Vengeance, I do not have that comparison to make. the ride is amazing! it absolutely blows your mind!
Ryan, your content is amazing as always. I love learning about roller coasters and geeking out with you.
You know a coaster is good when you can feel the airtime through the screen, definitely aiming to ride this sometime soon
Having grown up going to this park, and riding Gwazi for most of it, I can say this is now among my favorite coasters in the park. Only ride to come close for me is Montu, and that's more because of the terrific turnaround on that ride (I almost never wait more than five minutes, if that, to ride). Gwazi will still have problems with that for a good long time.
this ride is absolutely insane. front row early in the morning is crazy but then going to riding this thing at night in the back row is like riding a whole different ride
Great video dude. I’m looking forward to more videos in this series. Also the way you say Gwazi is perfect, don’t ever change.
📠
I rode this coaster during spring break, hands down the best coaster ever, it was so crazy I forgot what happened after. Can’t wait to compare it to Steve when I ride it this summer
this looks so cool! thanks for making this video. hopefully i can get my family to travel to Florida for this. we used to go on road trips all the time. stopped for various reasons in the past half decade, and this might be a good motivator to start again
About the steel supports. In a IG media day interview with Jake Killcup, he said something about extra reinforcement as Hurricane bracing. Chances are the steel beams are the hurricane bracing.
Really dig this video. It had answers to questions I wasn’t even sure I had, but in the back of my mind definitely wanted to know. Keep it up mang! Can’t wait for the next in this series!
I’d love to see one in this series about some of KI’s newest coasters. All 4 of the newest coasters run consistently at pretty high capacities, and the newest 3 are pretty advanced for their model types.
Words cannot explain how AMAZING this ride is. My personal favorite RMC
Awesome vid! I like the concept of some videos being purely about how neat a coaster is, and not necessarily equating complicated=problematic. I look forward to more of these and of course the classic problematic vids.
Dude, you are such a huge nerd for coaster ops and I am one million percent here for it 🤓👏
Busch Gardens Tampa has amazing coasters and I'm glad the Iron Gwazi is helping bring people to the park to ride them. Even Scorpion was a quick fun ride when I was there this weekend. The only coaster I don't care for is Tigris
I got to ride Iron Gwazi 5 times when I went to Florida a few weeks back, and honestly it made my #2 coaster of all time, which pushed down Twisted Colossus. What surprised me the most was the insane amount of speed, I had gone into it thinking it would be similar to Twisted Colossus and was greatly surprised. My favorite element is the death roll.
What’s number one ?
always appreciate the amount of detail put in to these videos
iron gawazi is my favorite ride. i love all of the features that iron gawazi brings to the table. it is so much better than the original gawazi, i am so glad they upgraded gawazi into iron gawazi
Another Great video. I don't even ride Rollercoasters anymore. But love your detailed breakdowns and walk throughs. Should do a big hard cover coffee table book of Rollercoasters. 😁
I'm really looking forward to Ghostrider. I lived close to Knotts growing up in the early 80's with Corkscrew and Mantazumas and until I moved away late 90's just before Ghostrider started going up. Will be awesome to hear all about it.
Busch Gardens is 10 min away from my house. I think the twist and shot is my favorite element on Iron Gwazi, Mainly because i keep my hands up for the duration of the coaster and the way the twist and shout dives under the lift hill gives some great head chopper feels.
Amazing video series Ryan! Your in-depth videos are my favorite coaster content
Love the video! I found the theoretical 3 train capacity overview super fascinating, and learned a bit more about how programming can change a coaster so dramatically. Looking forward to more content!
Awesome Content...I will be making my way from Texas to Tampa later this year..and I'm so excited to add this credit..
Just off our 2nd ride, definitely faster than our first ride at start of day. I rank it #3 for me personally, but not better than SteVe and Voyage. It's woefully short.
Let's not talk about how slow the loading process is
Im doing a 2 week rollercoaster roadtrip
Sfga
Luna park
Sfne
Sf great escape
Sf darien lake
Waldaamer
Cedar point
Kings island
Kennywood
Idlewild
Lakemont park
Hersheypark
Dorney park
Knoebels
And the fact I have so mang of these videos to follow up on...
Im happy. Thank you for your great content.
Me and my company did alot of the metal work for the ride and station. It was such an awesome experience to be on the other side of waiting for a ride to open
Outstanding video. I especially appreciate the discussion of operations and suggestions for how to improve them. I'm really disappointed to see how little effort seems to go into designing rides with high capacity in mind. Of course, it will cost the park more; and unless there is sufficient pressure from consumers, parks are incentivized to cheap out on the ride and then sell guests the "solution" to the inevitable long lines via skip-the-line passes, which then makes the standby line even slower. It's a real pain point at my home park SFOT, and I actually go there less often than I otherwise would due to the absurdly slow lines Giant gets. By contrast, Universal really knocked it out of the park with regard to capacity on Velocicoaster. That line MOVES.
just got to ride this twice today for the first time
absolutely loved it
2nd train of the morning
perfect weather
Great Episode of the Theme Park Marvels! Iron Gwazi is a great roller coaster! And I'm glad everybody in the coaster community had a fun time riding on this coaster! It's also a improvement to the original Gwazi that use to operated before they torn it down. It's a fun RMC I-box for a roller coaster!
I have been on it. The bounce of wood but smooth steel ride. And you really don't know what to expect to happen next, not as predictable as an old out & back.
Amazing video as alway, Ryan! Can’t wait for Velocicoaster!
Iron Gwazi was awesome, I'm so glad I got the chance to ride it this year.
Just consistently elite videos! Love this new series idea, can't wait to see what's next
Rode it a few weeks ago, this and Steel Vengeance are my favorite, both totally different experiences, completely insane. So fast, mind bending, out of control feeling, so many mis directions.
Love this channel with the reviews and tech of a Rollercoaster. The last time I was to this park Gwazi was dueling. It was a cool experience. The first time I visited this park crocodiles were in Montu's first turn to the lift and the MCBR were not on. I'm hoping to get back to this park soon as Steel Vengeance is my #1. to see if this takes it down.
Absolutely a kick ass video. I appreciate the work out into this. Thank you Ryan.