Now for the meta-question: WHY do people like carnival rides?
The one in this state calls it The Turkish Twist.
The aforementioned Gravitron is a little different: the floor doesn’t drop out; instead, the “seats” are padded panels on the walls, tilted back at a slight angle, that slide up when the ride reaches a certain speed. The effect is similar, I suppose.
Not to be confused with ‘The French Mistake’
I get motion sickness pretty easily, so it’s probably best for everyone if I just avoid all the spinning rides. I’ll let Mike Birbiglia describe what would likely happen if I were to ride one of those rides.
At the Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville AL they had this goofy “trip to the moon” ride that used centrifugal force to simulate high gravity boost–the ride was dark inside and they warned you quite strenuously to keep looking toward a light in the center of the drum to keep from getting motion sick. I of course just had to experiment with looking one way and the other to see if it actually would make me barfy and it kinda did. That was an interesting inner ear experiment and it permanently cured me of any desire to go on those spinny rides where I might be downspin of someone who didn’t know to face toward the middle and might have a full onboarding of fair food and beer.
The amusement park I worked at in high school had a scrambler inside a big vinyl dome.
The “Himalaya” at our park was called the Thunderbolt. That was a fun one to run, it was the only place where the operators could pick the music and have the PA to interact with the guests.
I love any and all spinning rides - Enterprise, tea cups (esp. with a strong partner) and especially the centrifuge-type thing where you are pinned to the wall! Not only do I love to spin, I actually find it strangely, incredibly, relaxing. I could literally fall asleep smiling on the floor-drops-down ride!
My wife did one of those at Cape Canaveral - really did a job on her for a couple of days.
When I was a kid, I LOVED the Tilt-a-Whirl. When I HAD kids, my stomach wasn’t what it once had been. One day I took y kids to Kiddieland on a kinda col day. Very few people there. So when we got on the Tilt-a-Whirl, the operator figured he’d do us a solid w/ an extended ride. It felt like it would never end. Man, I thought I was gonna ralph!
I don’t know if it has a standardized name, but when I was a kid my favorite spinning ride had seats shaped like planes and you had a stick that actually controlled of the vertical movement of your plane. I just liked that it wasn’t just a ride, it had an interactive element.
I hear you. When I was a kid, I loved all those rides that sling you around in different directions and never felt even mildly sick. About twenty years ago, I took my daughter and her friend on the Tilt-a-Whirl at a carnival. I staggered off that thing thinking, “Never again.”
Oh yeah, the Tilt-a-Whirl was fun to run. There was a button that slightly slowed the platform, and you could really get the cars spinning if you timed it right. You could pick on the car your buddies were in.
I don’t know if they are still that way, this was 30 years ago.
They don’t. Carnival rides are a Russian Deep Fake.
Okay, hear ya go – 8-minute video of a REAL spinning ride shaped like a plane with a stick to control the vertical movement with a real interactive element:
Lol never thought of that, but it was like a giant Spirograph
I like all the rides mentioned on this thread.
My favorite spinning rides were rather similar, The Round Up and Scat. Both spinning rides that you stand up on.
So I’m going to bring up a spinning ride that I have not seen in 50 years. I was a 10 year old kid the last time I saw it.
It was identical to the scrambler EXCEPT the car you sat in was round like a wash tub with a circular bench seat. and a one piece seat belt. 3-4 adults could fit in it or 4-5 kids. In the middle was a wheel about the size of a car steering wheel, maybe a little bigger.
The ride action was just like the scrambler, which was fun in itself. But if you turned that wheel you could make your tub spin like a mutha fugger. It was a crazy wild ride to say the least. People would be crawling away from that ride because they were so dizzy.
I don’t know what the name of this ride was. We referred to it as the “barrels” as the seats looked like silver barrels or wash tubs. The last time I saw one was at a firemens picnic circa 1970.
Anyone else remember such a ride or has seen one ever?
Sounds like Tea-cups.
Vaguely similar (as is Berry Go Round and a root beer barrel ride I’ve seen) except the ride I’m talking about was on steel girders like the scrambler and the barrels were spun in alternating positions just like the scrambler does. Other than the barrel cars it was identical to the scrambler.
We saw this ride a couple of years in a row at a firemens picnic, late 60’s up until about 1970. It was the only real big ride they had there, the others being a merry go round, a train like in “The Jerk”, and a small ferris wheel. Wasn’t a big carnival midway. Maybe it was some knock-off and that’s why it’s so obscure. It was real puker. You could spin yourself sick.
Ah yes puke n spin.