Dynamic Boundaries for Ride Vehicle Speed Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
Amusement park rides lack mechanisms that allow riders to control their vehicle's speed and direction while maintaining safe vehicle spacing and throughput, which hinders the ability to create unique and engaging experiences while ensuring operational efficiency.
Innovation Solution
Implementing dynamic boundaries that can change size and shape along the ride path, allowing riders to control their vehicle's speed and direction within a defined envelope, while a controller ensures vehicles remain within these boundaries to maintain safety and throughput.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If riders are allowed to control vehicle speed and direction freely, then rider experience and engagement are improved, but vehicle spacing control and throughput management deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic boundaries that can change size and shape along the ride path, allowing rider control within flexible limits while maintaining throughput. The controller dynamically adjusts the boundary envelope based on vehicle position and ride section, enabling free control in some areas while constraining it in others to ensure safe spacing and meet throughput targets.
2Adaptability or versatility
If dynamic boundaries are made configurable with changing size and shape, then control flexibility is improved, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The ride path is divided into multiple sections with different boundary configurations. Each section has its own dynamic boundary parameters that can be independently configured, allowing flexible control without requiring complex global calculations. The controller processes each section separately, managing complexity through spatial segmentation.
3Reliability
If vehicles are constrained to remain within dynamic boundaries, then safety and spacing are improved, but rider freedom of movement deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The dynamic boundary enforcement applies different levels of constraint to different locations along the ride path. In sections where safety is critical (such as near show elements or tight spacing areas), the boundaries are tightly enforced. In open sections, riders have greater freedom within the boundary envelope, creating local variations in control freedom that match local safety requirements.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for controlling vehicle progression along a ride path of an amusement park ride. The method includes receiving inputs from a passenger of a vehicle on the ride path and processing the received inputs to determine a vehicle state change. The method includes determining a present or predicted vehicle state and comparing the present or predicted vehicle state with constraints defined by a dynamic boundary associated with the vehicle. The method includes issuing vehicle control commands to a drive assembly to implement the vehicle state change if it complies with the constraints. The dynamic boundary is moved logically along the ride path at a nominal to define a set of boundaries for movement of the vehicle along the ride path. The vehicle state change may be a change that causes the vehicle to travel at a speed differing from the dynamic boundary while remaining within the dynamic boundary.