The legendary, record-breaking “Olympia Looping”, once the biggest mobile rollercoaster with five subsequent loops, is one example. For years it has attracted several hundreds of thousands of excited customers. In order to guarantee their safety however, all tracks, powertrains, brakes and conductions need to work 100 percent perfectly. PRUFTECHNIK supports the safety maintenance every year to guarantee a safe fest.

The roller coaster owner and operator called GKN, a maintenance service provider, who is responsible for checking the reliability of the 62 powertrains, which mark the pulse of the ride.

This includes 76 individual checkpoints, which lift the coaster wagons up to an altitude of 54m. This has to be done in order to get the accreditation for the Oktoberfest by TÜV Süd, which makes a final functionality check of all rides before the fest starts.
Factors like narrowly-constructed powertrains and cardan-shafts as well as exposed height and limited access force the technicians to use a Hot-Spot Analysis with thermography since conventional visual inspecting methods don’t work efficiently on this extreme ride. To check the reliable function of the powertrains the all-new condition monitoring system and vibration analyzer VIBSCANNER 2 by PRUFTECHNIK was called into action for what could be deemed its very first great job.

And indeed some malfunction was found due to pinpointing via an in-depth vibration analysis. The failure could immediately be eliminated and repaired, and the monitoring task went on – up to the highest point of 54m where the coaster wagon usually is released and accelerates up to a top-speed of nearly 100 km/h.

During the years the “Olympia Looping” has more or less become some kind of special landmark of the Oktoberfest. It is a must that it is running – and it has always run, due also to the great efforts and the expertise of PRUFTECHNIK Condition Monitoring.
Thanks to the brand new VIBSCANNER 2 the complete measuring task could be shortened down to only approximately 2/3 of the actual time that was needed in previous years. But despite its great speed and the little time effort, the data quality is absolutely reliable and shockingly good. Its core is designed to meet the highest data quality in the shortest range of time not compromising any lack of data or any mis-measurements caused by sensor issues.

The climb to the top of the 54m high roller coaster, with all its 76 measurement points, usually takes some time; whilst each individual measurement is being taken the technician could sit and enjoy the beautiful environment of Bavaria’s capital city. These times are over – now each measurement only takes just a fraction of the original time used in former times and the technician can speed up to the top. In concrete numbers: time needed until 2016: approximately 4-5 hours; time needed in 2017: 1 ½ hours. What an amazing time-saving!

RESULT:
The brand new VIBSCANNER 2 by PRUFTECHNIK enhances speed of measurement by uncompromising any data quality even when several measuring tasks are undertaken simultaneously. Mobile vibration analysis has become easier and faster than ever before.