Spiral Lift Block Issue

[Mi-Nigle]

Hi everyone.

I'm having an issue with block brakes at the moment on a Spiral Roller Coaster in Factory Capers.

I've created a simple track with a spiral lift and two block brakes before returning to the station. Normally this would allow me to have 3 trains, but it only allows 2.

Further to this, when I test the ride: 

1. Train-1 leaves the station
2. Train-2 enters station
3. Train-2 remains in station even after Train-1 has left the lift hill (an effective block, right?)
4. Train-2 only leaves the station once Train-1 has cleared the first block brake.

If I add another set of block brakes, it allows for 1 more train but testing produces the same strange behavior of waiting in the station until previous train has cleared the whole track.

Is this a bug? Or am I doing something silly? I've tried spacing out the block brakes, reducing the number of cars per train and adding an extra piece if lift hill after the spiral one. Nothing works.

I've been playing RCT on and off since its release and have never encountered this issue before. I wondered if it might be a quirk of Spiral Roller Coasters where they couldn't have spiral lifts as blocks or something but a quick search turned up nothing, and I can't find anyone else with this issue.

Any help greatly appreciated, thanks.

[X7123M3-256]

7 hours ago, Mi-Nigle said:

Is this a bug? Or am I doing something silly? I've tried spacing out the block brakes, reducing the number of cars per train and adding an extra piece if lift hill after the spiral one. Nothing works.

It appears that the spiral lift piece is not counted as a block. The downward sloping lift piece won't be either - only an upward sloping slope-to-level lift piece counts as a block IIRC.

[Mi-Nigle]

Thank you very much X7123M3-256! This has worked. How strange the spiral lift isn't counted as a block.

Anyway problem solved thank you.

[X7123M3-256]

30 minutes ago, Mi-Nigle said:

How strange the spiral lift isn't counted as a block.

These rides had an unusual lift design IRL - there's actually a motor mounted on the train connected to a drive tire, and the lift has a power rail which supplies power to the motor to drive the trains up the lift. The trains are then unpowered for the rest of the circuit. I am wondering if this design prevented the lift from being used as a block for some reason.

[Mi-Nigle]

2 hours ago, X7123M3-256 said:

These rides had an unusual lift design IRL - there's actually a motor mounted on the train connected to a drive tire, and the lift has a power rail which supplies power to the motor to drive the trains up the lift. The trains are then unpowered for the rest of the circuit. I am wondering if this design prevented the lift from being used as a block for some reason.

This is very interesting! I never knew that. Hadn't ever thought about how the curved lifts would work.

I'll always remember the unusual roar/buzz sound that the Black Hole at Alton Towers used to make, maybe this had something to do with it.

Thanks again.

[X7123M3-256]

1 hour ago, Mi-Nigle said:

Hadn't ever thought about how the curved lifts would work.

There are/were a couple of Schwarzkopf models with a curved chain lift, and a few others that used track mounted drive tires, but the ones with a spiral lift (like Black Hole) have onboard motors. This site has detailed information on the various lift systems used by Schwarzkopf - many of these ride types are found in game.

[Gymnasiast]

One problem, as far as the game is concerned, is that the top section of the spiral lift hill is not a distinct track piece, unlike a regular lift hill top, block brake or end-of-station piece.