After the underwhelming opening of Disney's California Adventure, the Walt Disney Company
refocused their revitalization efforts by investing over a billion dollars into the
park.
In 2012 the opening of Cars Land marked the completion of this effort opening 3 new rides,
Radiator Spring Racers, Luigi’s Flying Tires and Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree, a unique
family ride that whips riders back and forth and is a modern take on a teacups ride…
Or is it...
Welcome to Amusement Labs, where today I’ll show you the history, construction and technology
behind Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree.
Make sure to stay to the end for a contest.
This video is sponsored by Levi Valentine, Felix Monteza, Brandon Wiggins and Tyson D
at patreon.com / amusement labs.
Get early access and more through the link below.
Located at Disney’s California Adventure, Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree is a moderate
thrill family flat ride located in the Cars Land section of the park.
The ride takes place inside the junkyard of Tow Mater Towing and Salvage, the fictional
small business from the movie franchise.
This 90 second ride seats riders in tow trailers as baby tractors traverse 4 large turntables
back and forth whipping riders left and right along the way.
Watching riders cross paths and weave around, guests may often question how it does this
safely and consistently.
Let me explain...
History (first a little background) As I hinted at earlier, there’s more than
meets the eye with Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree.
For some of you eagle eyed Disney fans, you may recognize a small one in the same park,
Francis’ Ladybug Boogie.
The rides are a modern take on a Cuddle Up, a vintage carnival ride from… the 1920s?
As odd as it sounds, Mater's Junkyard Jamboree rips a page from amusement ride history by
modernizing this over 100 year old ride.
Originally produced by the Philadelphia Toboggan Company in the 30s, the Cuddle Up was a large
teacup style mechanical ride that weaved riders around multiple turntables.
Sound familiar?
The ride was extremely popular because of its scrambling near miss movements.
The Cuddle Up used large gears that meshed together to align holes on the edge of the
turntable to shove the cups from one turntable to the next.
The ride itself was based on the mechanics of a maypole braider machine.
Info (manu) Made by Italian rides manufacturer Zamperla,
Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree is a custom enlarged Demolition Derby flat ride produced exclusively
for Disney.
During its development Walt Disney Imagineering meshed a classic whip ride, also from the
same Cuddle Up era, with the ride.
Rather than riding with the attached vehicle riders swing back and forth as mentioned.
Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree features 2 identical ride systems for capacity with a total of
22 whip vehicles, 11 on each system patterned along the turntable.
How It Works In the ride system we have our vehicle, which
consists of 2 shuttle bars with small wheels on each end.
On the bottom of each bar is a flat vertical metal fin that works into the transferring
motion.
Each shuttle bar hinges on one end to the central support column like wings on a bird.
This column then rises out from inside the mechanics of the ride to the rider vehicle.
The additional whip vehicle hinges to this column and uses a gas dampener to prevent
any hard jolts from the swing limit bumpers on the side of the spine of the whip vehicle.
The weight of riders rolls on 2 caster wheels located under the whip vehicle.
To better explain the ride’s main mechanics we’re going to split it into 3 layers that
will mesh together to create the weaving motion.
Starting from the bottom we have The Switching Layer, The Loading Layer, and on top the Concealment
Layer.
Switching Layer: On the bottom of the ride’s mechanics is the Switching Layer that interacts
with the pair of vertical fins on each vehicle assembly.
As the vehicle makes its way around whipping riders up above, there’s a lot going on
below.
When a vehicle reaches the hand off point where it’s handed off to the next turntable,
a toggle wheel flips left and right directing the pair of fins from one side to the other.
This wheel then guides the vertical fins to the next turntable which physically removes
it from the previous table and attaches it to the next.
The wheels on the sides of the shuttle bars and fins run inside a circular channel that
helps them follow the turntable around.
At hand off points the channel suddenly becomes a straight line that points to the channel
of the next turn table.
At this point the channels form a slim X shape which directs the vehicle off.
Due to the sharp transition at the center of the X and the toggle wheel, the shuttle
bars are not able to remain on the turntable and must follow the straight line in the intersection
to the next turn table.
Loading Layer: Above the Switching Layer is the Loading Layer.
This layer of the ride consists of 4 large turntable spoke structures that rotate during
the ride.
The 2 outer turntable structures feature 5 spokes while the 2 inner structures feature
6.
This ensures that there is always 1 empty space in front of each vehicle for the vehicle
ahead of riders to occupy.
Each spoke of the structure has 2 large I beams that reach out from the center to where
each vehicle will sit.
When a vehicle is pushed over from one turntable to the next the shuttle bars slot into the
spoke arms where they are held.
One of the six or five spoke arms will only grab one of the shuttle bars, not both.
When the hand off happens the arm grabs the shuttle bar that was NOT being held by the
previous turntable spoke arm since there’s equipment in the way.
The support column that sits between the shuttle bars is not centered with each spoke arm and
instead sits on the left or right side past the shuttle bar clamps.
These massive structures each use a motor with rotation control to ensure that they’re
in place to receive the available shuttle bar to clamp onto.
The nudging motion at the hand off point releases the shuttle bar clamp, pushes the shuttle
bar off the spoke arm and then the other shuttle bar is clamped by the receiving spoke arm.
Concealment Layer: As you can see the mechanics of the ride are quite complex and dangerous
for guests so on top of all of this is the concealment layer.
To make loading faster and safer for guests 4 stationary circular plates are placed in
the center of the turntables supported in the center.
Wide flat ring shaped platforms are then supported by and rotate with the spoke arms.
Patterned along the edges of the platforms are slotted openings to the basement of the
ride.
Through these slots the central support column for the vehicle protrudes up and out.
Unlike the spoke arms these slots will align at the hand off point forming a pill shaped
slot.
The column can then slide over to the other side of the slot before separating.
When a slot is not occupied by a column a spring-loaded cover slides in from underneath
and is pushed over when the column slides over.
To better explain the ride’s mechanics I’ve created this simplified functional model of
the ride.
As you can see there’s 3 distinct layers just like the real ride.
The Switching Layer, The Loading Layer and the Concealment Layer.
Here we have a vehicle assembly with a bumper on either side of a central column.
These bumpers are nudged around and follow a central channel just like the shuttle bars.
The channel is formed by these teardrop shaped plates and as you can see form a slim X shape
which makes it impossible for the handoff to not happen.
That’s the Switching Layer.
In much the same way these gears contain a slot for the vehicle assembly to slot and
clamp onto as they go around.
This is the Loading Layer.
Finally we have the turntable surface that rides along with the motion of the vehicles
and contains the patterned slots that align at the hand off points to let the columns
slide over.
This is the concealment layer.
So now we can put it all together.
The vehicles under the surface have 2 shuttle bars with 2 wheels each that hinge on the
central column.
Each shuttle bar has a vertical fin attached on the underside of the bars.
As the ride begins all platforms and spoke arms need to move together.
The wheels on the shuttle bars will follow the underground channel around the turntable.
At the hand off point the channel straightens and the toggle wheel bumps the shuttle bar
fins to the other turntable.
This unlocks the shuttle bar clamp and slides the vehicle to the other side where the receiving
spoke arm clamps onto the other shuttle bar.
During our ride in tractor trailers we can hear one of multiple different songs performed
by Larry The Cable Guy, the voice of Mater.
So that’s roll, unclamp, slide, clamp, roll, unclamp, slide, clamp, roll.
This then repeats for 90 seconds sending riders whipping back and forth until the ride slows
down and guests can disembark.
This innovative and rare rendition of a century old ride is a wonderful family oriented addition
that is both gentle and fun for all ages.
Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree has shown that with a little imagination a ride system of
its age can absolutely stand the test of time.
And that’s how Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree Works.
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Thanks for watching and I’ll see you in the parks.