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Kentucky Rumbler
Website: Beech Bend Homepage
Ride Type: Wooden Coaster
Ride Status: Running
Average Rating: 4.0769
TPC Overall Rank: Rides need more than 25 reviews to be ranked.
Reviews: 16
Last Review: 5/31/2011 11:18:00 PM
In User Top 10: 4 times.
User Tracker Count: 19 times.
 

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5 Rating
0 Rating Rate Down Rate Up rln6377 on 5/31/2011 11:18:00 PM
A true gem in a park full of mediocre rides. very smooth ride and air time.

4 Rating
0 Rating Rate Down Rate Up shag9004 on 6/4/2008 9:38:00 PM
Date Ridden: Summer of 2006. Times Ridden: 3 in the very front, middle, and very back seats. OK, when you visit Beech Bend, this is the reason you are going if you an enthusiast. It has been a couple of years since I rode this and the layout is very difficult to remember. However, I do remember the superb laterals, the smooth ride, and above all else the comfortable seats. I even remember the smell of the wood since this thing was so new at the time we rode it. I also remember making the comment to my girlfriend that I hoped Beech Bend kept this beauty up as wood coasters sometimes do not age well if neglected. That being said, the critic who used the term "mini-Thunderhead" hit the nail on the head. The similarities are there however this coaster does have its own personality. It is easily one of the top 20 woodies I have ridden (out of around 50) and offers everything a good woodie should. There is not a huge amount of airtime but the laterals more than make up for and the re-ride capabilites are very high. You will not get abused or come off the coaster sore, you will only be laughing and running around the que to get back in line. We got in 3 rides on a day the park was virtually empty and I regret it to this day. We could have ridden this thing 10 times an hour and if I ever get back up to BB I vow to do so. As it is, the Rumbler scores a very solid 9 as a coaster which accomplishes exactly what it was designed to do: be fun!!!

5 Rating
+1 Rating Rate Down Rate Up methos on 4/26/2008 6:47:00 PM - User's Top Ride #6
What a great coaster, lots of floating air time, a fast paced ever changing layout.

4 Rating
0 Rating Rate Down Rate Up T-Rex on 12/4/2007 6:41:00 AM
Great wooden coaster that makes Beech Bend worth visiting. The layout was a twisted mess, GCIs specialty, and therefore the ride included many fast and sudden turns complete with some good air-time hills too. Even with the turns, there was not a single rough spot on the ride and the station fly-by was pretty cool too.

4 Rating
0 Rating Rate Down Rate Up rocketman23 on 8/15/2007 11:11:00 AM
It is what it is: basically a mini Thunderhead. In other words a good twister with air mixed in. Makes Beech Bend worth a visit. Its lack of size keeps it from being a top 20 caliber ride, but its still better than most woodies.

4 Rating
+2 Rating Rate Down Rate Up hrrytraver on 7/14/2007 10:32:00 AM
i had a lot of fun with this thing. its impossible to dislike a ride like this - its got more heart stuffed into its dense little frame than id think GCI would ever do after riding ROAR and LR. but more than anything it gave me hope in the future of the modern compact twister layout. at the top of my coaster fantasy list (a long enough list) is this vision, a simple dream- one morning a designer from GCI is going to wake up with a wild hair, put his undershorts on backwards, get into his car through the trunk, and use the left turn signal for every right turn he makes on the way to work. THEN, hes going to eat a whole tin of altoids, make himself a cup of coffee the consistency of roofing tar, sharpen all his pencils with his teeth, boot up his computer using a hand-cranked AC generator he had been keeping in the basement for the apocalypse, and design the perfect, devil-may-care, raunchy, tight, clautrophobic, fast, MFing twister woody to top all twister woodies. i may be a dreamer, but i think its possible...KY rumbler is not this ride, but its the sweetest GCI ive been on since wildcat, and its a much better overall ride and design than wildcat, though not nearly the intensity. after disappointing rides on a few modern twisters ive kinda felt that perhaps the genre was best left to the hand-drawn old timers who made them fast and sick because they didnt have a computer talking over their shoulder like HAL from 2001 - "Hello sir, that transition you just designed will be a very uncomfortable combination of laterl G forces and negative G forces. Please change it immediately or this program will do a forced quit." frankly, the relatively low speeds of a compact twister need to capitalize on STRONG forces, and a generous variety of those STRONG forces or else they will be dull. a great small wood coaster should also capitalize on its own structure to create illusions of dangerous speed and pending doom. throw in a little vibratory energy to create an uneasy mistrust in a coasters structural integrity. not quite achieving this devilish lunacy, GCI and KYrumbler still win out because, while not very intense per se, this coasters certainly got speed, tons of energy, a little bit of noisy track "rumble", nice lats, a few surprises, and even a healthy bit of serious floating airtime (yo, what took you so long GCI!). the first drop, with the wicked speedy turnaround into the strange, mangled dip is a gorgeous floater air event complete with a death defying head chopper. that drop gets this ride off to a righteous start. everyone knows that GCI is the master of the layout and this coaster is no different. its a hell of a design, bent, beautiful and all gorgeous timber 100%! the trains look great, like a cross between an antique fire truck and a millipede, diving and scrambling around the convoluted course. when i first saw the coaster from my car, after driving down a road that looked like someones driveway, it hovered over the horizon like a wooden emerald city which should have had "surrender hrry" hanging over it in the sky. the coaster is an escher-like impossibility in that setting, surrounded by green hills and farms. i enjoyed the ride immensely from my first ride, and i had about 9 rides total, in various seats. but something happened that killed my buzz for KYrumbler. i went up the road later in the day and got on the raven at HW. for airtime and intensity, raven stuck it to me and put the little rumbler into clearer view. small woodens can be far more intense than what GCI seems to be willing to show us. fast, fun, and packed with eventful elements these GCI twisters, but just not "whoa, holy sh*t!" on the brake run. come on GCI dudes, one of ya, cut loose and give me a mind blower...please!

4 Rating
+2 Rating Rate Down Rate Up Timberman on 7/2/2007 9:09:00 PM
Kentucky Rumbler gets the 2006 "Field of Dreams" Award for Meritorious Accomplishment in the Construction of a Roller Coaster in the Middle of Nowhere. They built it, and we came. I am very happy to report, moreover, that Rumbler was well worth the trip.

Ive generally been of the opinion that GCI roller coasters, especially those with Millennium Flyers, are like the stone fox that you thought was unobtainable, somehow still managed to obtain, and then discovered she wasnt really that special after all. I dont want to offend anyone on this family website, so I wont elaborate on this analogy beyond stating that GCI coasters seem to trade on their looks. Their physical presence is so overwhelming that you want to believe youre having an amazing time in their company, even when you know deep in your heart that youd be much happier and more fulfilled with that around-the-way CCI or that old clunker that used to turn heads when you were a kid but that everyone thinks theyve moved on from since then. Yet what Griffon does for B&M in this critics opinion, Rumbler does for GCI: it takes the best trademark elements of an underperforming marque, uses them to their fullest advantage, and then ups the ante by incorporating standout elements not seen on previous designs. In the case of Rumbler, those added elements are an excellent, two-stage first drop; a layout that lets the Flyers do their usual twisty thang while feeling more like a run-away train and less like a string of roller skates; and some excellent blending of horizontal and vertical forces. Meanwhile, the ride also has GCIs usual knockout looks, an incomprehensibly undulating track, and trains designed to negotiate the layout with the sure-footedness of a Himilayan Sherpa. Thus, Rumbler almost lets you have it all. Shes sexy, shes fast, shes curvy, and she cooks.

I say almost, however, because while the Millennium Flyers perform better here than on that notable disappointment Lightening Racer, theyre still saddled with the same excrable dual restraint system, the business end of which is a big, steel, vinyl-coated rectangle that digs ever deeper into your midquarters over each successive bump. As Ive noted elswhere, its like having someone heave an anchor into your lap. No matter how hot things have otherwise become, thatll cool your jets in a hurry. In Rumblers case, it negates the payoff of what should be several notable airtime events. The grey matter tops out in the brain pan; the digestive organs float weightlessly in the abdomen; and the lungs hover in the thoracic cavity. The butt, however, stays firmly planted on the seat. Thus Rumbler takes you to third base, but leaves you needing a cold shower when all is said and done.

Still, coquettish though she may be, Rumbler neverthless represents a big step in the right direction for GCI. Once she warmed up in the summer heat, and with a full train of admirers urging her on, this ride served up no-nonsense intensity over an excellent layout. But for the chastity-belt-like death grip of the lap rectangles, we could have had a beautiful relationship. Many riders, moreover, will happily accomodate this quirk.

So really, Rumbler, its not you. Its me. Its not a question of whether or not youre perfect, because were just not perfect together. I wish you well, however, and know that most riders would be lucky to have you. I just think the best thing for both of us is that we go our separate ways. So chin up, Shorty. Chin up. Well always have Bowling Green.
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5 Rating
+1 Rating Rate Down Rate Up coasterkid on 6/6/2007 1:42:00 PM - User's Top Ride #7
From the moment they started building Kentucky Rumbler, I knew it would be Ozark Wildcats brother. I have already expressed my love/hate relationship with Thunderhead (I just think it is overated), and ultimately had many-a-people complain. Oh well! This and Ozark Wildcat are better. They both have more airtime, and layouts I much prefer. Anyway to the Review: Beech Bend is a bizarre little park, that is quarky, and I love it. when I went there was a total of like 100 people in the park, so I probably rode Kentucky Rumbler around 20 times. Though I think I still prefer Ozark Wildcat, this one is so good for so many reasons: It has some great airtime for a GCI (at least 7 times)and the normal graceful turns that you expect from GCI are first rate here. None of the GCIs that I have ridden I would call out of control, they have a fun factor that no other wooden coasters have, but I dont feel like the train is going to rip off the track. This is one of my top ten rides because it is not stop fun, and the airtime and layout are simply otherworldly.

5 Rating
0 Rating Rate Down Rate Up coasterwom on 9/6/2006 6:23:00 PM
Appearance:9 Nice trains and nice track layout. Capacity:7 Very slow loading only one train used. Ride Quality:9 Very smooth, and alot of good elements. Fun:9 Very much fun but could use more hyper ride operators to add to the excitement of ride. Rerideability:9 This is a good coaster for younger and older people. I rode it 10 times when I visited the park. I especially liked the cows in the pasture to add to the scenery and the race tracks in the background. The Kentucky Rumbler is a wood twister coaster that is 96' tall, 2,827' long, Built by GCI in 2006, travels at 50 mph, uses Millenium flyer trains, it has about 30 crossovers, and it is a very smooth ride.

4 Rating
+1 Rating Rate Down Rate Up ginzo on 7/26/2006 8:10:00 PM
This ride makes the trip to the backwater worth it. It deftly twists around itself with grace and smoothness. There isnt a hint on roughness on this, and it looks damn nice as well. Decent air time can be had in the back seat, but of course air time isnt GCIs specialty. GCI, however, did do an amazing job of packing such a nice ride into a relatively small footprint. The ride is almost relentlessly intense as well. I did notice one slight slow down point during the middle of the ride. This happened on every ride. I would have rated this an 8, but I gave it another point due to the fact that the ride ops were cool enough to let us ride it once by ourselves. Not many smaller parks would waste a run of their best coaster on just 2 people during regular operating hours.

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