Originally Posted By phruby I went on Indiana Jones last Saturday and couldn't believe the condition it was in. First the pole in the spike room was not working. This is typically the case most of the time I've gone in the past few years. The dispatch room felt darker that it usually does. Not sure if lights were out. The door room was completely dark and you could see Mara down the long hallway. The door that Indy was holding shut didn't have blue fabric moving. You could totally see supports behind it. There was no water in the lava pit. At the end we sat for over a minute before the ball started to roll in front of us. We just sat there with Indy over our heads in silence. In fact, as we got to that room, we could see the ball retract and room reset itself. It's like we got there a couple of seconds too early. I thought Indy just went through a major referb recently. The ride looked terrible.
Originally Posted By monorailblue The spike room pole, as you say, generally has not worked most of the last 19 years. Door room could have been malfunctioning. There was a time when things like that (or the AK Yeti) would have caused a ride to be shut down until repaired, but those days are long gone. (Trivia: what were the three figures in Pirates that used to cause the Attraction to close if not working?) Ball room: there might have been cars backed up down below, so the ride could not progress and just took a bit of a pause. Not sure. I've been through it where the ball doesn't show up or roll at all. That was jarring. I have no idea what "blue fabric moving" refers to. Have I missed some critical part of the scene for two decades? I don't really know what to comment about the "lava pit".
Originally Posted By PeterPan1313 I went on Indy during a Halloween party last week. A lot of the effects and lighting were turned off. Two show scenes were completely dark, one of them being the room with the gigantic ball, the "river" effect wasn't working. Probably the worst in terms of show that I've seen the ride. It's not a mechanical "broken" issue per se, but just that the ride isn't properly started up in the a.m., and/or nobody is alerted that sections of the ride aren't working, so nothing is done. If somebody doesn't know how to reset something then they just figure that there's enough in the ride for guests to see anyway.
Originally Posted By EighthDwarf The spike room pole works every time for me, you just have to pull extremely hard
Originally Posted By phruby >>I have no idea what "blue fabric moving" refers to. Have I missed some critical part of the scene for two decades? I guess its blue/green. It's the effect behind the doors Indy is trying to keep shut. Typically this fabric is blowing to make it look magical in the lighting. Now it was not blowing as you pass it. You can see inside the doorway to the beams holding up the set piece.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros When I rode over Labor Day, things looked generally good, but a few of your comments still applied. The pole in the spike room wasn't working (at best that effect seems to be 50/50) nor was the rope in the rotunda. The lights in the 3-door room seemed to be turned off, and the real door was stuck open the whole time. The fabric behind Indy in his first scene seemed to just be dangling there; in the past it had swirled like a vortex, but it looked like it was barely attached at the top. Overall, it was better than I'd seen it at times, though not nearly at 100% >>I have no idea what "blue fabric moving" refers to. Have I missed some critical part of the scene for two decades?<< As Indy is trying to hold the doors shut, it's what can be seen through the crack in the doors. The effect was changed circa 2008 to make it more noticeable. It's now a long cylinder of reflective fabric that spins like a tornado, with blue and green lights on it. Not a major or complex effect, but it's pretty effective when working >>(Trivia: what were the three figures in Pirates that used to cause the Attraction to close if not working?)<< Assuming this was pre-Jack Sparrow (if not, then the 3 Jacks), I'd say the captain of the Sea Wench, the auctioneer, and the 'pooped' pirate sitting on a barrel. They're the only ones who have any real dialogue that would be missed if they were gone
Originally Posted By doombuggy We went in May and it reopened after a 3 month shut down. They should have been embarrassed to reopen in the shape it was in. The whole door fx wasn't working,dark and stuck on gold the whole trip. Indy is the Yeti of DL, It needs a year long work over.
Originally Posted By SuperDry I went on Indy just last month and all of the effects were working perfectly. But that was at DisneySea.
Originally Posted By believe >>>>First the pole in the spike room was not working.<<<< They completely removed the pole a few months ago where it looked like it never existed. So I'm actually happy to see it back. >>>> There was no water in the lava pit.<<< I don't think there ever was water there. It was just smoke effects to make it look like lava. Without the smoke, it just looks like glowing colored lights. The door room seems to have stopped working for the past year. Very disappointing. We always make a bet on which door we would get.
Originally Posted By monorailblue <<It's not a mechanical "broken" issue per se, but just that the ride isn't properly started up in the a.m., and/or nobody is alerted that sections of the ride aren't working, so nothing is done. If somebody doesn't know how to reset something then they just figure that there's enough in the ride for guests to see anyway.>> Failure to start properly in the morning--umm, no, siree. There are so many ride-throughs by cast--ops and maintenance, both on the clock and off the clock--every day that it isn't even funny. Major effects and entire show scenes are not dark because someone forgets to turn them on every day for days, weeks, or months on end. What nonsense.
Originally Posted By monorailblue Yes, pre-Jack, those were the 3 figures. I'm not sure if they'd go 101 even for a malfunctioning Jack any more. Shutting down for bad show is almost an unimaginable concept at Disneyland these days.
Originally Posted By leemac <<It's not a mechanical "broken" issue per se, but just that the ride isn't properly started up in the a.m.,>> Huh? IJA is like all major E-tickets - it has a single automated boot up. CMs would have to deliberately deviate from the SOP to get show scenes not to "start up properly". IJA has been a headache since Day 1. Ops hate the attraction with a passion - it wasn't designed with them in mind.
Originally Posted By leemac <<Ball room: there might have been cars backed up down below, so the ride could not progress and just took a bit of a pause. Not sure. I've been through it where the ball doesn't show up or roll at all. That was jarring.>> IJA actually runs at less than 100% utilization for this reason. I forget the number but there are something like 3 hold/idle positions prior to the climatic scene. The system should not allow a jeep into the final show scene until it has reset and is ready to go. I've never heard of the marble having issues and that is a fundamental show flaw - it should be enough to send the attraction 101 until fixed.
Originally Posted By leemac <<I went on Indy just last month and all of the effects were working perfectly. But that was at DisneySea.>> And it demonstrates what happens when you have annual attraction closes. Every major attraction at TDR is typically closed between 3-6 weeks every single year in order to do basic preventive work like replace wear-and-tear components before they actually fail. The US parks have never bought into preventive maintenance - it is always reactive.
Originally Posted By TP2000 "IJA has been a headache since Day 1. Ops hate the attraction with a passion - it wasn't designed with them in mind." That sounds like a failure of the designer. In this case, Tony Baxter. If they aren't designing an attraction for the people that will work there for the next 50 years, then who the heck are celebrity Imagineers like Tony Baxter designing them for? It can't just be for the first few customers that ride it during its first month of operation before routine maintenance needs to start happening. Anyone who designs a product like that without thought to operating it long term, whether its a phone or a car or a house or an amusement park ride, is simply a bad designer.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>I went on Indy just last month and all of the effects were working perfectly. But that was at DisneySea.<< There were a couple minor things not working when I went in July, and the vortex was less impressive than I remembered from a previous trip (though still pretty cool). Still better than DL's typically is though : /
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>IJA actually runs at less than 100% utilization for this reason. I forget the number but there are something like 3 hold/idle positions prior to the climatic scene.<< In the past it seemed like it was relatively common to get stopped just prior to the rats-on-a-log projection or just before entering the dart room, but every time I've ridden it in the last 4-5 years we've gone through there without stopping; we then get to the boulder scene and have an awkwardly long wait while the vehicle ahead of us moves out of the way. Since waiting there kind of spoils the illusion of any real danger, I'd much rather wait a scene or two before >>The system should not allow a jeep into the final show scene until it has reset and is ready to go. I've never heard of the marble having issues and that is a fundamental show flaw - it should be enough to send the attraction 101 until fixed.<< I've seen it a couple times where we round the corner into the scene as it's in the middle of resetting. It's really trippy feeling the car stop as the walls around you slide away from you. It reminded me of those scenes in movies where it zooms in on a character's face while the background gets pulled away from them. Again, it takes away the sense of peril, but being a dork I really enjoyed getting to see how it worked
Originally Posted By leemac ^^ It sounds like Ops/maintenance have manually bypassed the fullback control as that shouldn't happen under the SOP. I've no idea what the local teams are doing but that is definitely a deviation from the '94 SOP.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip << Anyone who designs a product like that without thought to operating it long term, whether its a phone or a car or a house or an amusement park ride, is simply a bad designer.>> Try operating an automobile without regular maintenance and see what it gets you. Blaming the designer is a cheap shot.
Originally Posted By leemac <<That sounds like a failure of the designer. In this case, Tony Baxter. If they aren't designing an attraction for the people that will work there for the next 50 years, then who the heck are celebrity Imagineers like Tony Baxter designing them for?>> A lot of Tony's generation of imagineers used to fail to consult with ops or even consider their input. It is all politics sadly. It isn't just WDI - the various Team Disneys just aren't good partners sometimes. Rocket Rods was another attraction that ops weren't appropriately engaged with in development.
