The Joker (Six Flags México)

The Joker
Six Flags México
Park section	Pueblo Francés
Status	Operating
Opening date	March 7, 2013 (2013-03-07)
General statistics
Type	Steel – Spinning
Manufacturer	Gerstlauer
Designer	Werner Stengel
Lift/launch system	Chain lift hill
Height	48 ft (15 m)
Drop	27 ft (8.2 m)
Length	1,351 ft (412 m)
Speed	31 mph (50 km/h)
Height restriction	42 in (107 cm)
Cars	Riders are seated 2 across, in 2 rows, for a total of 4 riders per car.
Flash Pass available
Single rider line available
The Joker at RCDB Pictures of The Joker at RCDB

The Joker is a spinning roller coaster located at Six Flags México a theme park located in Mexico. Designed by Gerstlauer, a German ride manufacturer and Werner Stengel. Joker opened for the public on March 7, 2013.

Its design consists of several cars holding four riders each. While the cars traverse the track, they spin around according to the angle of the track and the shifts in the riders' weight.

History

The Joker at Discovery Kingdom
as Tony Hawk's Big Spin

Six Flags built two spinning coasters to two of their parks in 2007 and with such high reviews from guest, the company was looking to expand the product to its other markets. Towards the end of the 2007 season, Six Flags Discovery Kingdom announced that it would build Tony Hawk's Big Spin, themed after the professional skateboarder. The ride was originally billed as the "Tony Hawk experience" and was designed to have the look and feel of a giant red-and-black skatepark. It offered a full "extreme sports" experience, with monitors in the queue lines displaying highlights of the history of action sports and a large spinning Tony Hawk figure crowning the ride.^[1] Tony Hawk's Big Spin opened to the public on May 28, 2008 in California, in the Sky section of the park where Zonga was previous located.

In November of 2010, Six Flags began the process of cancelling licensed intellectual property deals they had with various brands including what they had with Tony Hawk himself as the company was emerging itself from bankruptcy at that time.^[2] Discovery Kingdom was operating until January 2011 of that 2010 season for Holiday in the Park, so the park quickly dropped Tony Hawk's name from the ride and any other memorabilia associated with him and operated the coaster as Big Spin for the remainder of the season. At the start of the new season in 2011, Tony Hawk's Big Spin was officially renamed to Pandemonium like its other sister parks.

Superman: Ultimate Flight was announced by Six Flags in late 2011 to be built at Discovery Kingdom, which would replace their Pandemonium roller coaster.^[3] Pandemonium at Discovery Kingdom officially closed at the park on January 1, 2012. As a relatively new coaster, Six Flags moved the coaster to the headquarters of Larson International and Roller Coaster Museum, which are both located in Plainview, Texas to keep as storage.^[4][5] In mid 2012, Six Flags México announced The Joker for the 2013 season.^[6] Track of the stored Pandemonium moved from Texas to Mexico to its new home, in which it reopend on March 7, 2013.^[7][8]

Layout

According to the Gerstlauer website, the manufacture has two different models of its spinning roller coaster collection and one where a park can customize to fit its desires. The Joker is the only spinning roller coaster in the company that is the 400 model are the 420 model. The 400 model, is shorter at 48 feet (15 m), more compact, and has a lower capacity. The layout consists of several "segments" separated by brakes. The first segment comprises a swooping drop and climb into the second segment, which is a series of S-shaped turns. The third segment is a heavily banked figure-8; the fourth is a series of hills that form a semicircle; the fifth is a pair of small hills; and the sixth is a helix into the seventh segment; a long loop, which leads to a massive hill, and finally into the brake run. For most of the ride, the cart is spinning around rapidly.

References