Steel Hawg (Indiana Beach)

It was a warm July early evening when I was looking up at the silent structure of Indiana Beach’s then-brand new Steel Hawg, having stopped testing and being informed that the coaster wouldn’t be operational that day, when a thought popped into my head: “This probably wouldn’t be that hard to design in NoLimits”. Officially I was working on Maverick at the time, although progress on that one kind of hit the rocks when I realized my expectations were higher than my abilities, and this looked like a fun and easy project to get back into the groove of things. Plus, there were no POVs available on the net at the time (still weren’t until a few months after this re-creations’ release) so that was extra incentive to have a way of virtually simming the coaster before I could ride it myself, which I finally did later that October.

As for the merits of the ride itself, I recommend reading my Steel Hawg Analysis, if you haven’t already done so. If you want to download the coaster, click on the large title image at the bottom of the page.

I began plotting out the layout not long after my visit there. The early attempts actually came off rather well, probably due to the intuitive, boxy nature of the layout that doesn’t hold many surprises in terms of how it all fits together. The central support towers also helped greatly as a measuring device to make sure elements stayed in the proper relative position to one another, and to check I wasn’t stretching anything out. The image to the side shows what it looked like within the first week or two of work. Aside from adjusting the positioning of the elements further, the main thing I needed to change from that version was the heartline roll. From the off-ride photographs I had taken that July it appeared as though the heartline was downward curving, dropping off further after it completely inverts (from a physics point of view just a design would make sense opposed to having it decend along a perfectly straight line because it helps counter-act the rotational motion forcing the rider’s necks into the side of the restraints as the car tries to pivot back upright…) However, when I actually rode it in October, I could see as we entered the roll that it was centered around a straight heartline path, since the track formed a ‘barrel’ I could look straight down, so that needed to be changed.

Also to be changed (in fact this was probably the biggest headache in the track design process) was the rise/turn combo that immediately preceeds the first drop. I looked at my photos and recognized that it would be impossible to re-create it as it is without getting both red lateral and negative g-forces. How the ride managed to maneuver this turn I had no idea, and still really don’t, but I suspect NL exacerbated things slightly by not having as high a frictional coefficient as the bulky cars on the real thing do. Originally I thought it twisted vertically around the heartline, and somewhere in there it managed to level to flat track as well, but I eventually discover through looking at photos from the other side of the ride that from the overhead view the curve radius needed to be constant, with the appearance of the track ‘whipping around’ suddenly created more by perspective. The final result still is in the red for g-forces, however NL’s g-force readout has always been a bit touchy anyway and I couldn’t reduce it further without severly compromising the accuracy of the element, which I’m fairly certain I got close to right.

Work on the ride was light throughout the fall due to school, but by the beginning of Christmas break I had a layout I was happy with and went about the process of heartlining the coaster with the Auto Heartline Generator. I wish I spent a bit more time on this because while the heartlining helped a lot, it also highlighted two inaccuracies that I didn’t want to go back and fix. The first was the roll into the dive loop, in my version it is taken along a straight heartline path (at least from 90-180 degrees), which creates a hard jerk into it and then static rotation into the inversion, not like the smoother, more continuous roll found on the real ride. The second was the transition into the heartline roll, for some reason mine dips down here and doesn’t look like the real thing which is a much smoother and more natural transition. For some reason I was also plagued with a very small banking twitch throughout the element on nearly every vertex the AHG, and I couldn’t seem to find any solution to it. In the end I minimized it and kept what was left of this twitch, feeling it was actually accurate to the real ride which would shunt around the track as the orientation with gravity pulled the cars in different directions (and I still do), but this was the main criticism point among many raters at CoasterSims. I’m not sure if continuous transition into the roll was creating some Con/Rel Roll problems, but there was nothing more I could do with it.

With not much to do over winter break I got the supporting finished in short time (I knew I had my themeing turn for the Three Blind Mice challenge coming up in the last week of winter break as well, so that motivated me to get this ride done on time). I think this part of the coaster turned out the best, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a support job quite like it attempted in NoLimits, and they really push the level of realism to the next level. They are very accurate, I rarely laid down a support I didn’t see in one of my photos or on something from the RCDb. It also gave me a huge respect for the design of the ride, as I discovered that literally every piece of track in the ride fits in perfectly with those four central towers, and there really wasn’t any room to do anything different without having a less efficient design. The placement of the block brakes, how they use the lifthill stairway, was particularly evident. It also created a bit of a problem as I found out that just the slightest thing off with the track could be detected in the supports; many of the horizontal supports are used by several pieces of track (such as the support attached to the top of the dive loop, this crosses over and also holds up the back of the first drop) so everything had to be precise otherwise things wouldn’t line up and I’d have to fake it. Thankfully, I guess as a testament to the time spent making sure the track was accurate, I had very few instances where I had to fake a support to get it to fit. I think going into the roll was one place, and I already mentioned I wasn’t satisfyed with that section of track. Extras were a bit of a pain, mostly getting all the paneling on the exit ramp, and trying to fit the fence and pathways in. Doing all those stairs and emergency platforms as supports wasn’t exactly a picnic either. I wish there were more signs around the ride because I included every main sign I could see, at least that weren’t in the station, and it doesn’t feel like there’s enough custom in the scene.

I think this is by far my best re-creation. From off-ride it really looks like the real thing, and if S&S had made a CGI version based directly on the blueprints I don’t think it would look that much more accurate than what I’ve got here, at least from the midway and offride. On-ride there are admittedly a few more problems, but they still all came together pretty well and for the couple places that didn’t turn out quite right (heartline roll, dive loop) there were places I think I got spot-on (first drop and curve, final turn). While I can’t defend the accuracy of the shaping in every instance, again from off-ride I’m amazed at how everything fits and looks like the real thing. I challenge anyone to produce a NoLimits re-creation that looks better from off-ride; I’ve never seen one, and this was all with no complicated 3D scene objects, everything in there except the CS Park Pack items are just flat textured panels.

In any event, this is probably the single ride in my portfolio that I think shows off my best work, and I rather hope you’ll enjoy it as well. It wasn’t easy making so please, if you download, leave a comment after you ride saying you enjoyed it or didn’t or what could be improved, what was great, etc. I make these rides for other people to enjoy as well, and that doesn’t work when they’re only recieved with stony silence. Click on the image below to download.

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