3 replies to this topic

[skiPhreak]

I'm sure this questions has been asked before on here but 6 packs have been out for quite a while now and resorts have in a way chosen sides on whether to always go with HSQ's or HSS.

In my opinion from riding HSS and HSQ's it seems like on HSS you never really see every seat on every chair filled as much as you do on HSQ's. At what point are you wasting capacity? I feel like you can get as much real capacity out of a HSQ as a HSS simply for the fact that a HSQ is easier to load every chair with 4 ppl and it stops less. The same kind of principal behind a FGQ and a HSQ, if the FGQ and the HSQ have the same capacity say 2400pph the express is going to have more real capacity. Does this apply to HSS and HSQ's? HSQ's usually have capacity up to 2880 sometimes 3000 and HHS up to 3600 most new HSS are only built with a 3000-3200 capacity is this because it is just too hard to get 3600 pph out of them? I mean 3600pph that is just 3600 chances an hour someone will fall, drop a poll and stop the lift.


Do resorts measure real capacity? Ex how fast a lift runs ever hour times the chair spacing? What is the real capacity on a given day? I understand this might be hard to calculate because you can't tell how many riders are on each chair but can resorts still estimate this? What do you think the real capacity of each type of lift is?

This post has been edited by skiPhreak: 21 December 2008 - 04:11 PM

[Kicking Horse]

skiPhreak, on Dec 21 2008, 04:59 PM, said:

I'm sure this questions has been asked before on here but 6 packs have been out for quite a while now and resorts have in a way chosen sides on whether to always go with HSQ's or HSS.

In my opinion from riding HSS and HSQ's it seems like on HSS you never really see every seat on every chair filled as much as you do on HSQ's. At what point are you wasting capacity? I feel like you can get as much real capacity out of a HSQ as a HSS simply for the fact that a HSQ is easier to load every chair with 4 ppl and it stops less. The same kind of principal behind a FGQ and a HSQ, if the FGQ and the HSQ have the same capacity say 2400pph the express is going to have more real capacity. Does this apply to HSS and HSQ's? HSQ's usually have capacity up to 2880 sometimes 3000 and HHS up to 3600 most new HSS are only built with a 3000-3200 capacity is this because it is just too hard to get 3600 pph out of them? I mean 3600pph that is just 3600 chances an hour someone will fall, drop a poll and stop the lift.


Do resorts measure real capacity? Ex how fast a lift runs ever hour times the chair spacing? What is the real capacity on a given day? I understand this might be hard to calculate because you can't tell how many riders are on each chair but can resorts still estimate this? What do you think the real capacity of each type of lift is?

Today, I would say 90% of all chairs on the Village Express @ Snowmass was loaded with 6 skiers for @ least 4 hrs today. During that time the lift was running 900FPM and had roughly 25 stops in that 4 hr period. Hr cap is 3,000 at 1050fpm. It's away running 950 or slower depending on # of stops and slows, The drive op can slow it down if there are alot of stops or slows.

[skierdude9450]

Even in a perfect world I don't think that you can get 2400 people up a detachable quad in an hour, because some chair will have three people, or someone will fall. However, I think that if a six-pack is properly managed and the lines are set up correctly it is very possible to run it efficiently. There are some cases where a high capacity chairlift is a bad idea. Take for example Quicksilver lift at Breckenridge. After years of battling huge lines at the aging quad, they decided to build a chairlift with as much capacity as they could possibly pack. Therefore, the double loading system (which had previously been used in France with great success) was chosen. This allowed for a 3600 p/h capacity with a 12 second loading interval. What they did not consider is that it also creates a 6 second unloading interval. Since the lift is used primarily by beginners, you can see that there will be some big problems. Due to the large crowds as mentioned, it is very common that every chair will have 6 people, so when 6 beginners try to unload the lift, there's a greater possibility that someone will fall and many times cause the rest to fall. This happens so often that the average time to ride the lift is over 8 minutes due to slows and stops, when the theoretical ride time should be just under 5 minutes. This is a case where "real capacity" should have been factored in before designing the system. I would estimate the "real capacity" of Quicksilver at about 2000 p/h. I think that Breckenridge could have made a more efficient system by installing an 8 person gondola with a capacity of 2800 p/h which would have far fewer loading and unloading issues. When the "real capacity" is factored in it would be a much more efficient system than a fully loaded six-pack.
$0.02

[liftmech]

Well put. 'Real' capacity is almost never considered, it seems.