Grease is the blood of rides

[@thehamelsduck1600]

Grease is the word, is the word that you heard . It's got grove, it's got meaning. Grease is the time is the place, is the motion. Grease is the way we are feeling. OH I'm sorry wrong Grease. Sorry I couldn't resist and I didn't see that anyone else had done it yet.

[@djsinkaz]

Two weeks in a row now that I've slid in with the first comment 😂. These videos are great, I learn something new from them every week.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Awesome!

[@jpgiles1725]

Video topic idea: Comet and Skyrush at Hershey Park are getting new restraints this year. What all goes into modifications for an existing ride? Do they have to get manufacture approval? Insurance approval etc? You might have done a video similar to this , but still curious on what's all involved when they make modifications to an existing ride, especially new restraints.

[@daniev6]

I've wondered too.

[@nathonizamboni875]

The grease really gets everywhere. Touch any part of the ride guests don't usually touch and boom! grease. You don't even realize because the coating is fairly even and it just looks normal until you wipe a finger across it.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Or start to fill out paperwork. Guess they wanted a fingerprint on this document.

[@DangerHuub]

You would not believe it, but two weeks ago I was in this themepark and all of a sudden my partner told me with a straight face to stay of the air gates. A couple of hours filled with walking, screaming and having fun had tired me to a point that I was unintentionally leaning on them. She told me I'd better go and apologise to Ryan, so here we are. I'm sorry. I'm pretty sure it won't happen again.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Haha! That’s a good partnership right there! Funny for sure thanks!

[@thehamelsduck1600]

The Pinfari coaster we had at the park I worked at we used STP motor oil additive on the chain. The log ride used a food grade grease that was a lot stickier. Then we had two different kinds of grease for various flat rides.

[@litz13]

Degreasing would be so much easier if it wasn't so darned dangerous from a health/safety/environmental standpoint to stick the suction hose of a pressure washer into a 55gal drum of BrakeKleen.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Haha! Right

[@chandler7695]

Enjoying a 30 min long video about grease was not on my bingo card for today. 🙂

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Right?!

[@danieledwards4274]

Thanks! Grease vs Oil always got me. Do a video on wheel assemblies!

[@classicamusementparks]

I've seen more than a few online debates about lubrication philosophy. Suffice it to say opinions vary greatly. It would be interesting to know more about different specs used across the many rides and attractions at a typical park. Also, shoutout to the underappreciated lithium grease.

[@christopherswanson1628]

We use the tacky grease for the ring gears on our dance party midi 360 ride and it is a mess. Worse part is that the force of the gears squeezes it all out and its dry the next morning. It's not fun to clean up, especially when the man lift decides it doesn't want to start while you're 30 feet in the air and the park is about to open

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Oof I think most mechanics have been there. I’ve a to leave equipment mid park several times because we couldn’t start it and didn’t have the time equipment to tow it out.

[@wdavem]

Very interesting video. One place grease or oil can't ever go is on videotape. On some of the larger professional tape machines if there's even a tiny dab of grease on the tape when it passes the spinning head drum, it will instantly grab the tape and wants to rip it off the reels or out of the cassette at 20+ miles per hour... Usually this only happens during repairs when grease has to be added to the loading mechanism, RIGHT next to parts that can't have any grease. The tape is supposed to float on air over the spinning drum, so grease spreads all over the drum instantly and the tape synches down hard once there is any adhesion at all. Then of course grease can transfer from the tape to every single 'tape-bearing' surface in the machine and re-contaminates everything instantly until you find everywhere it went. (that includes inside the videocassette). Tape doesn't like grease solvents/additives either which can absorb below the surface, and might re-contaminate when that part gets run again. Very old machines use one continuously running AC motor to run everything with drive belts, the drum is always spinning no matter what with high torque. So a 'drum wrap' can get violent enough to break things or wreck the alignment. I've been meaning to try that on purpose to get to know murphy's law a little better.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Sounds super tough to maintain. Is this an area where fixing something is out of the question? So many thing are just “replace” but older stuff, there’s no replacement.

[@wdavem]

It's sometimes not easy, occasionally a nightmare when too many things go wrong at once! there are no new VTRs like that made, except the latest HD formats. Finding new old stock replacement parts can be impossible. Sometimes you need and/or end up with many dead carcasses of the models that are currently popular. There's a lot of one-of-a-kind hybrid electronic modules and mechanical parts that can't be repaired. Both digital and analog on one IC sometimes. Substitutions can be possible with mechanical parts, though occasionally rollers have to be re-made with new rubber on the original bearings. Sometimes you can save a machine from going to scrap by down-grading from fully-featured into one that just plays back tapes (by using 'new' parts for another model) I've made a working machine out of multiple badly trashed parts carcasses, more then a few times, not for a customer though.@@ryantheridemechanic​

[@Scjheinen]

And the smell of burned grease makes me almost vomit haha. Grease is the best friend and the worst enemy of a ride mechanic.

[@thehamelsduck1600]

LOL you sure wouldn't want to work in a steel mill then. When the hot billets run across the rollers it instantly heats up the grease and it runs out of the bearings just to be refilled with an automatic greaser. Very Very nasty smelling place and needles to say grease is everywhere.

[@MAV2w]

I love your videos I recently found your channel and love it! Thanks for making awesome content!

[@ryantheridemechanic]

No problem. Glad you found it! And Welcome!

[@SavageMark824]

This is by far my new favorite channel on KZbin, i love all these videos! Keep up the amazing work!

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Awesome thank you so much!

[@oldschoolsteve5116]

A few years ago, my son and I were on gatekeeper at Cedar point, and my son got a quarter size blob of grease on his leg. Not a huge deal tho, he had some old shorts on.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

That can happen. One reason we switched the Vekoma wheels from oil to grease.

[@ColoradoAnimatronics]

I once witnessed a new mechanic launch an entire tube of a certain very expensive Kluber grease out of the grease gun. It landed all on the floor. I didn’t see nothing! 😂

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Haha!!!

[@S.J.C._Entertainment]

I bought one of your animatronic heads lol

[@ColoradoAnimatronics]

@@S.J.C._Entertainment Well hello! I suppose I need to make a personal account haha

[@S.J.C._Entertainment]

@@ColoradoAnimatronics I’d sub.

[@jacobplatt3066]

Our auto oiler at work uses a compressed air and oil ratio to apply an even coating onto the chain and the oiler is timed so it will stop when a certain amount of revolutions have been completed

[@TheCoasterSerpent]

So there is a documentary, you can find here on youtube called Kennywood Memories. At about 4 1/2 mins in, it shows the maintenance workers doing daily inspections and greasing on one of their old woodies. The maintenance man gets into the front row of the train, stands in front of the buzz bar, and proceeds to ride twice around for each side, while standing and oiling the track. First, I am curious on your thoughts about the safety of this procedure. Next, I am curious about if oiling the track this way is an indirect way on oiling the wheels themselves, or if this is even necessary on newer wooden coasters? How often does this kind of thing need done?

[@sharkheadism]

I've seen that video and laughed because that's such a reminder of the way things used to be done. Most parks have a cycle timer display on the control panel for the crew to monitor and see that the ride is running normally, fast, or slow. If the operator is paying attention they can call maintenance out and prevent a fault from running too fast or slow. I worked at a Six Flags park and the mechanics would add a little oil with a paint roller to the top of each rail for about 20 or 30 feet at the base of the lift, and sure enough just that bit of lube would get carried around the track and the cycle times would start coming back down. Don't want to add too much though, you'll get the opposite problem lol. The wood coaster I'm familiar with had a normal cycle time of around 60 seconds (lift crest to first brake); 55-56 seconds and you're about to get an overspeed fault; 64-65 seconds and you'd better do something because eventually the train just wouldn't return.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

@@sharkheadism totally agree.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

I took a look. The old days of little safety is so fun to see. Haha! For ease and speed we always just lived the low spots. It carried all the oil around the track just fine. We tried a couple of times to do the same thing riding in the back coach trying to oil as we went but it made a big mess and got more on the wood than the steel. The video was not safe but all safety laws are born from blood. OSHA laws are basically blood laws because enough people had to die before a law was made. It’s not great but a glimpse in time really.

[@TrueLies23]

I dont know if I hate over greasing components or over tightening components more. What are your opinions of pushing out old Grease by pumping a bunch of new Grease into the fitting,generally speaking? See a lot of guys default to doing that in different industries and I'd imagine that's usually not ideal. Enemy of Grease being more grease

[@ryantheridemechanic]

I’d rather over-grease than over tighten. I generally just pump until I get a bit of pressure feedback in the gun. But I’ve heard 5 pumps or 10 pumps and I think that a little ridiculous. But if you can push a bit of grease out you at least know it’s working and not plugged.

[@midwestthemeparkenthusiast1187]

Nice shot in front of Dragon Slayer at Adventureland!

[@ryantheridemechanic]

That’s the most intense freespin I’ve ever ridden.

[@sumguy8]

Medium is singular, media is plural. A media is not grammatically correct. Love the video still!

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Thanks

[@kylea9022]

You have way too much time on your hands 😂

[@sumguy8]

@@kylea9022 yup

[@richywiggins3845]

Really interesting video, never appreciated grease on rides. A question I have is how much does weather affect rides, when blackpool pleasure beach opened last week it was cold 4C (40F) with heavy rain and rides were going down all day, the next day it was slightly warmer, dry and sunny all the rides worked all day.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

It really boils down to the ride. And sometimes even the station. We had a hawk flatride that wend down in the rain because the load platform was too slick to walk on.

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Here is a quick video on it. kzbin.info/www/bejne/iIDbkmWmhMakpJYsi=R1gEISTKmN-VKIFY

[@kylea9022]

Ive worked on an auto oil system before for an old pump , when i tunened on the isolator to see if it was working it just burst into flames 😂 " thats not good "

[@ryantheridemechanic]

haha! just staring at the fire "Hmmm? interesting" haha!!

[@danieledwards4274]

Ryan, why don't classic wooden coaster trains use nylon or other poly wheels? Can you do a vid all on wheels and wheel assemblies?

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Is this video what you are looking for? kzbin.info/www/bejne/m2engWaphr6Ziq8si=fy1slMkLSBY64t0s

[@ericcartman3385]

What viscosity do you use for your rides such as high-speed rides... Such as coaster bearings... I mean you wouldn't use a lightweight on a ride that goes a lot slower than such as something that goes 100 mph.... And i had to grease a river rapids ride....ill say it took me about 2 to 3 days cause there were so many links and had to do top to bottom. Thank god for a pneumatic grease gun...

[@ryantheridemechanic]

The old Vekomas took 30w oil. The only time viscosity change was needed is during cold periods. For higher speeds you would probably want a lower viscosity so the oil could move quicker.

[@ericcartman3385]

@ryantheridemechanic OK.....that answers a lot when it comes to the speed of the ride during certain types of days and certain times of the year and all that does stuf.. I'm glad you mentioned Vekoma cause they are the closest to the old school arrows

[@ryantheridemechanic]

@@ericcartman3385 we eventually put everything on grease. Kluber Topaz NB52 went in everything

[@ericcartman3385]

@ryantheridemechanic Hey even the air gates even have grease....lol... I know that for a fact...I have had to actually go and hit with the gun...lol So yes GREASE EVERYWHERE...even on the French 🍟 fries.... Also SHOW IDEA... How about the routine and what you have to do to get the rides ready from the time of punching in up to the park opening ... and maintenance checks during shift...

[@ryantheridemechanic]

@@ericcartman3385 yea ally of people have asked for “a day in the life of” a mechanic. I need to get on that.

[@wizardadam8413]

i was fully expecting you to have blue lips or teeth after you made the "grease"

[@ryantheridemechanic]

That would have been funny!

[@dindog22]

did you get a green screen?

[@ryantheridemechanic]

No I did not

[@dindog22]

@@ryantheridemechanic how did you make it look like you were standing in front of a Free Spin?

[@ryantheridemechanic]

@@dindog22 oh I just use KZbin shorts function! It takes some manipulation but I can get it to work. I’m consider myself inventive when it comes to doing things like that. Where there’s a will there’s a way.

[@bassjasinski]

Hope that grease isn’t made from fossil fuels 😂

[@ryantheridemechanic]

Less and less for sure