264 replies to this topic

[DonaldMReif]

Someone remind me, is King Con using all-new towers or is it reusing tower tubes from the original quad?

From the fourth photo of the combi tower, the configuration of the sheave trains suggests that King Con will rotate counterclockwise, like the original lift.

This post has been edited by DonaldMReif: 08 August 2015 - 09:02 AM

[Peter]

New Quicksilver Gondola pics from today, terminals are going up: http://liftblog.com/...-august-update/

[DonaldMReif]

So how will they rope-evac the Thaynes Canyon crossing section of Quicksilver Gondola? Something like what exists for Red Pine Gondola?

[jclark]

Three photos of the Sugarbush VT FGQ installation: http://www.newenglan...php?storyid=299

[DonaldMReif]

The latest update from Peter is that King Con and Motherlode are progressing much faster than the Quicksilver Gondola. King Con has had its tower tubes flown in. 14 of the lift's 15 towers are from the original quad, the exception tower being tower 1. Many of the towers have new extensions on them in order to make them slightly taller (is it a height clearance thing?) The concrete foundation for the loading carpet has also been poured.

The new red paint job used on the PCMR lifts actually looks like it might be a similar shade of red to the paint job used by Beaver Creek for chairlifts on the Beaver Creek Mountain section of the resort.

For comparison, King Con:


And the Birds of Prey Express:


And while there are no new photos from Vail Mountain, I'd think that Vail is presumably working on the Avanti Express lift at the same rate that King Con is going. Since the Avanti Express lift is a very important lift on the mountain, it presumably has to be ready for service by November 19th (Vail's ski season typically starts the weekend before Thanksgiving). So while I haven't seen any new photos from Vail, I'd presume that there's been substantial progress on the Avanti Express lift's terminals, and that they've also poured the base for the loading carpet as well.

This post has been edited by DonaldMReif: 11 August 2015 - 08:11 AM

[floridaskier]

The towers on King Con probably just need the extensions to maintain the same profile as before, with the Doppelmayr sheaves mounted below the crossarm instead of the CTEC ones in line. Most of the old King Con was very high off the ground, especially in the middle white tower section. Deer Valley ran into that issue with the new Mountaineer lift, which was very close to the ground and the road the first year and got tower tube extensions on several towers the next summer.

[DonaldMReif]

The photos make me think King Con will have more combi towers than the old lift. The original lift had two combi towers: tower 7 had combi sheaves but only on the downhill side, and tower 10, which had combi sheave trains on both uphill and downhill lines. From one of Peter's photos, it looks like there are at least three combi towers on the new King Con: towers 6, 7, and 10 for certain, and possibly also tower 8.

[Peter]

New Teton pics from today: http://liftblog.com/2015/08/16/teton-lift-gets-a-drive-terminal/

[DonaldMReif]

From Vail's Facebook page today:
 Avanti August 2015.jpg (657.44K)
Number of downloads: 90

That's tower 2 of the Avanti Express lift in the background. If you look closely, it looks like the tower has a small extension on it to make it slightly taller, so that the lift can maintain the same profile as before, since on the old lift towers, the sheaves were positioned just above the crossarms, except on the hold-down towers, towers 1 and 11, and the sheaves on the new Doppelmayr towers are positioned below the crossarms.

[DonaldMReif]

From the Twitter page @vailliftops, the foundations for the Avanti Express lift's terminals are starting to show.

Here's the bottom terminal:
 Avanti Express 08-21-15 02.png (1.15MB)
Number of downloads: 107

There's still no sign of tower 1, but I'm guessing that will come soon. At any rate, my best guess is the lift has 25 towers like its predecessor and probably will have somewhere around 145 chairs.

If you look at tower 2 in this photo, you can see that there's a slight bulge in the tower tube right below the crossarm. That's where the old tower tube ends and the new tower head begins. See, like King Con, the Avanti Express lift reuses the towers of the quad it replaced. However, as I said earlier, because the new Doppelmayr crossarms are designed with the sheaves hanging below the crossarm on all towers, and the sheaves on the original lift were positioned just above the crossarm, some of the towers have short extensions on them, which is ostensibly is so that the lift line maintains the original profile (though, I do wonder whether the hold-down at tower 11 will still be a hold-down tower or it will become a combi tower).

That concrete in the center of the photo appears to be the footers for the bottom terminal. To the right appears to be the base for the lift shack. The lighter patch of gravel just in front and left of the tripod in the photo, I'm not sure about, but it might be the base for the carpet (which means the Avanti Express lift might be a clockwise lift, unless that's the base for the new lift's shack on the right, in which case it's a counterclockwise lift.

[vons]

The unformed concrete to the left of the tripod looks to be clean out from the cement truck. It does look like formwork for a conveyor pit is sitting on the trailer to the left.

[DonaldMReif]

There's been a bit more progress on the upper terminal of the Avanti Express lift, where the base supports for the upper terminal have been installed:
 Avanti Express Top Terminal 08-23-15.png (793.06K)
Number of downloads: 72

I think that those four metal things between the trees on the left and the terminal supports are the base for the lift operator's shack, meaning the lift will be counterclockwise after all. It also looks like they might raise the terminal height so that the unloading ramp is slightly steeper than the original, similar to what was done with the Mountaintop Express lift.

[Peter]

DonaldMReif, on 23 August 2015 - 03:34 PM, said:

There's been a bit more progress on the upper terminal of the Avanti Express lift, where the base supports for the upper terminal have been installed:
Avanti Express Top Terminal 08-23-15.png

I think that those four metal things between the trees on the left and the terminal supports are the base for the lift operator's shack, meaning the lift will be counterclockwise after all. It also looks like they might raise the terminal height so that the unloading ramp is slightly steeper than the original, similar to what was done with the Mountaintop Express lift.

I got some pictures up there earlier today: http://liftblog.com/...ils-new-lift-2/

[DonaldMReif]

So, the Avanti Express lift has 26 towers, which is one tower more than the original lift. I can't help but notice in your photos that the old tower number stickers haven't yet been removed:



In this first photo of yours, the towerhead says it's tower 3, but its tube says tower 2. Now, since that's the first erected tower so far, that says to me that there will be two hold-down towers at the bottom terminal instead of one, spaced closely together like what's on Gondola One and the High Noon Express lift.

This means that from the bottom terminal up through what used to be tower 7A, every tower has had its number increased by 1. Tower 7A becomes tower 9. Above tower 9/former 7A, each lift tower has had its number increased by two. Hence, tower 22 is what was originally tower 20:


I can see there is at least one combi tower - tower 18 (the original tower 16). I'm guessing that tower 13 (formerly tower 11) has to be either a combi tower or a hold-down tower because that's where a steep climb begins, and tower 12 (formerly tower 10) might be a combi tower like the original lift.

In short, the Avanti Express lift will have 26 towers and somewhere around 145 chairs, and all but four of these 26 towers are reused from the original quad, the ones that are all-new being the first two towers (the new hold-down towers at the bottom terminal) and the last two towers (towers 25 and 26) before the upper terminal.

This post has been edited by DonaldMReif: 24 August 2015 - 09:27 PM

[Peter]

Lots of progress here at JHMR: http://liftblog.com/...t-home-stretch/

[DonaldMReif]

The upper terminal for the Avanti Express lift is taking shape. The pipes in the foreground appear to be the foundation for the shack.
 Avanti Express top terminal.png (1002.98K)
Number of downloads: 87

This post has been edited by DonaldMReif: 06 September 2015 - 03:44 PM

[Peter]

Some pictures from Solitude today...
http://liftblog.com/...summit-express/

[DonaldMReif]

Powderhorn has new photos of Flat Top Flyer on their Instagram page:
https://instagram.com/p/7ItXuSh4lv/

And a video, too:
https://instagram.com/p/7Iw_1OB4sF/

From the looks of it, Flat Top Flyer is reusing complete towers from Take Four, if the towers in the background of this photo are anything;
https://instagram.com/p/577Keth4oe/

This post has been edited by DonaldMReif: 08 September 2015 - 07:38 AM

[DonaldMReif]

One guy on Purgatory's mountain operations team has a blog that is covering the construction of the upgraded Legends Express lift:
http://www.purgatory...rt/mike-s-take/


Gwynn's High Alpine restaurant at Snowmass happens to have its own Facebook page and they've got a lot of photos showing constuction of the upgraded High Alpine lift and the removal of the original lift, which apparently is being relocated to Montana Snowbowl in Missoula:
 High Alpine 1.jpg (196.47K)
Number of downloads: 114  High Alpine 2.jpg (636.35K)
Number of downloads: 137  High Alpine 3.jpg (379.29K)
Number of downloads: 119  High Alpine 4.jpg (446.04K)
Number of downloads: 115

 High Alpine 5.jpg (436.21K)
Number of downloads: 106  High Alpine 6.jpg (478.1K)
Number of downloads: 99  High Alpine 7.jpg (533.85K)
Number of downloads: 101  High Alpine 8.jpg (534.15K)
Number of downloads: 72

[Peter]

We've known for awhile Doppelmayr uses the Euro- and American-style tower heads seemingly at random. Now they are using them both on the same lift! Pictures from Quicksilver today: http://liftblog.com/...silver-gondola/