Trip Report: Ohio State Fair

Columbus, Ohio - 08/14/1999

"Awwwww...I thought it was a new one..."

This afternoon, I jumped on the bicycle and headed down to the Ohio Expositions Center, about a mile and a half from my house. There, the Ohio State Fair was in full swing. I carefully maneuvered my trusty 3-speed through the parking lot and manacled it to the perimeter fence in a secluded spot behind a bush. I had visited last weekend, but this weekend I decided I wanted to ride a few rides. The midway is being handled by Amusements of America once again; ride tickets are $1 each, with most rides requiring two tickets; a P-O-P wristband is available for $15. I counted up the rides I wanted to ride and came close, so I bought the wristband.

The midway is a strange arrangement due to the position of a permanent site giant slide. Many years ago, the main midway ran down the middle of the fairgrounds in an area which has been taken over by food joints; the midway was moved to an area which used to be the infield of a grandstand which was taken down some years ago. So the main midway wraps around the back of the special events center that replaced the Grandstand. But that leaves this giant slide clear over on the other side of the fairgrounds. Traditionally, this is where A of A has put the kiddie rides, but gradually they have been loading that area with adult rides as well, particularly those rides which have a certain family appeal, such as the Sky Wheel and Tornado and a Carousel. So there really are two separate A of A midways. Here's a list of the rides on each...

(tickets - ride name - manufacturer - common name)
(note: Each ride listed only once. Some rides are duplicated on the midway)

Of course I didn't ride all of that stuff, but I rode quite a bit, starting with the Swiss Bob. Would you believe that the 16-car train still has 14-1/2 of the little "a.schwarzkopf" nameplates on the 'hoods' of the cars? Well they do! Good ride, and it runs with no active restraints...Which gave the operator a chance to tell everyone to "stay seated with your lap bars down....Oh, you don't have lap bars, do you?!"

On down the midway and around the corner is the Avalanche, a nice Pinfari Zyklon with a blue and white paint job. It's not the same Zyklon that A of A used to bring; this one is a little smaller. Also, this has that rolling brake thing on the end of it like the one Fantastic Shows bought from Holiday World. Hey! I get to add another carnival coaster to my count!

Then I saw it at the top of the entrance ramp. A little blue sign with some comment about rider restrictions. It got my attention because of the little cartoon figure...a little picture of a smiling stick of dynamite. A stick of dynamite? A very familiar looking stick of dynamite? Oh, good grief! I took a ride and had a very familiar ride experience. A stop at the show office confirmed what I had begun to suspect. This ride had just been purchased by Amusements of America from Fantastic Shows. This WAS the Holiday World Firecracker, letting me ride it yet again. This is the second time the ride has been painted in as many years!

I headed on over to the Looping Star, a Pinfari ZL-42 which I knew I had ridden before. I plopped down in the front seat of the last car of the 3-car train. I pulled down the shoulder bar, and it locked in place. Reflexively, I gave it a quick upward shove. It came up a couple of inches, then locked rigidly in place. Whoops! That's the first time I've gotten really bad headbanging on a Looping Star. Bad enough that I ended up with a headache for several hours afterward. So there are two things to remember about the ZL-42 Looping Star--
a) Pull the bar down tight against your shoulders, so that it doesn't line up with your ears
b) Once locked, the Pinfari shoulder bar does not move in either direction.
That said, the Looping Star is still a lot of fun. There's just something that doesn't feel right about putting a three-car, six-axle, twelve-passenger train through a 28-foot vertical loop! Watch out for that quick airtime pop combined with a sudden lateral kick right after the loop!

I hiked down the midway and failed to ride the Farfabbri Banzai. The ride is just a Kamikaze with the cage cut off, and the Kamikaze is one of my least favorite carnival rides. It has something to do with the shoulder bars which cannot hold riders properly in the seat. Well, they can't hold me, anyway...but ARM has a single-arm version of the ride, which I rode up in Cleveland. That was fairly decent...

I stopped in my tracks when I saw an ARM Quasar. An OPERATING Quasar. An OPERATING Quasar with CUSTOMERS on board! Usually when I see a Quasar, it's got a couple of deck panels removed, the center arm raised about a foot, and two guys underneath swearing at it. The Quasar is a flat ride with a wheel much like the one you find on an Enterprise. The tubs resemble the tubs used on a Chance Flying Bobs. When the ride is operating, the wheel rotates clockwise at 36 RPM (!), and the center rotates counter-clockwise at 18 RPM. So the tubs are going around clockwise at 18 RPM, but around a point which isn't quite at the center of the wheel. So the tubs kick in and out a little bit. It's an interesting ride, but it was almost more interesting to try and get in and out because the wheel doesn't seem to have a loading brake on it, so the ride kept moving while people were getting in and out.

Across from the Quasar is the Wisdom Tornado, and next to that is the Dartron Cliff Hanger. The Cliff Hanger is the latest incarnation of the Paratrooper. Dartron updated the Paratrooper a few years ago by redesigning the center. The updated center has a pivoting head on it and a main boom which can drop down below horizontal, to a downward-angled position. At that point, the pivoting head is held horizontal, and the result is that the tubs are hanging down low enough that they can be boarded from the ground...no platform is required. The tubs on this ride have seats that face both directions, and the ride is called the "Star Trooper." The Star Trooper safety system prevents the center from turning until the main boom is lifted to a horizontal position. This insures that the tubs and the rider's feet will not touch the ground. The Cliff Hanger has this same mechanical system on it, but instead of Paratrooper-like tubs, it has hang-glider-like tubs. Each tub holds three riders lying face down, in what looks like it should be a rather uncomfortable contraption. Actually, it's a neat ride. The action is essentially the same as a Paratrooper, but it's very different to be face-down through the ride. It's a bit unnatural, and I ended up with a stiff neck from looking up, but it is a nice twist on a classic ride. Later in the day I rode the Paratrooper, and the comparison is a very good one. Cliff Hanger has a couple of other interesting updates as well, such as the (magnetic?) brakes on the tub to facilitate loading and unloading.

Right across from the Cliff Hanger is the most demented looking ride on the fairgrounds. It is a Tivoli Spin Out, and it goes something like this--
a) The ride has 24 seats rigidly suspended from a claw-like assembly. This assembly, with six groups of four seats, all facing inward towards the center of the ride, rotates at about 20 RPM. This is mounted on a suspension arm which rotates at about 6 RPM, flipping the main center over and over, spinning it right side up and upside down. This arm is mounted on a lifting assembly which raises the suspension arm enough that the seats will clear the platform. The whole thing is attached to a platform which rotates at 6 RPM. This added rotation means that when the seats are right side up they are effectively turning at 14 RPM, and when upside down they are turning at 26 RPM. So everything is twisting every which way. It is an interesting ride, not at all sickening, but rather disorienting, and the shoulder bar assembly tends to make some scary noises. I don't much like being suspended by my shoulders, but at least there is enough surface area on the bar that it isn't painful. It's worth riding, but I don't think it's a ride I would go out of my way for.

I also rode the Pharaoh's Fury. They were having some trouble getting the thing to start initially (reminded me of the one I rode at Fun Spot in that regard...) but once running, it ran well. I got stuck near the center, but the more of these things I ride, the more I like the Chance ride. I think the Sea Dragon and Pharaoh's Fury run a little faster and a little higher than the Huss, Intamin, and Zamperla models. The one at Oaks Park (a Sea Dragon) was still better, though.

I couldn't leave the fair without taking a ride on the Sky Wheel. These things are becoming incredibly rare, it seems, even though they are a lot of fun. I can see why they are rare, though...while the double wheel design gives them higher capacity and a longer ride time than comparable-height single wheels, the boom rotation mechanism is a mess of wire-rope drive cables. Someone should update and reintroduce this ride. I wonder if it could be done on a single trailer...........

It's the best midway the Ohio State Fair has had in several years. Amusements of America seems to have gone a bit overboard on the funhouses and dark rides, and I think the fair must have complained a bit about that. Last year's midway was positively boring by comparison with this year. The fair runs for another week or so; if you are in the neighborhood you might consider a visit.

Oh, on the way out I took a ride on the Sky Glider. It's one of only two open-tub style amusement park aerial tramways in the state. The other is at Americana. As I glided down the center of the fairgrounds, I kept thinking about how the tub would make a great porch swing..... 8-) I wonder who built this one...

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

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