Batman the Ride: Backwards opens this month at SFMM

[ECG]

Six Flags Magic Mountain season pass holders get to ride Batman the Ride: Backwards starting today. Passholder preview days are March 8-9, 15-16, and then Batman the Ride: Backwards will open to the public on March 22nd. There's also a rumor that Colossus will also be running backwards at the same time as Batman the Ride: Backwards.
Six Flags Magic Mountain is the second park (following Six Flags Great America last year) to use the custom chassis that B&M built for the Batman clones to run backwards and there's been no word on which park will see it next.
Here's a POV video the park released:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj6u-yyGwU4[/youtube]

 

[Gavin]

Any idea how long it will run backwards for? There's a good chance I'll go in the summer and while it looks vile, I'd like to give it a go

 

[ECG]

I would assume that Magic Mountain will probably do the same as Great America and have this baby running backwards until the July 4th weekend, which means that last day it will run will be July 6th. It will then be down for about a week while they switch the chassis back.

 

[BBH]

Actually, the Great America backwards chassis is still at SFGAm, the hardware was flipped and the eighth car from the old train was added so now it's running forwards. This is an entirely new pair of trains.


Posted while reading your mind.

 

[Gavin]

From their website:

Coming in 2014

This spring, experience BATMAN The Ride and Colossus backwards!

So yeah, Colossus backwards is definitely happening as well. They don't say how long for though, so if it is just until July 4th, I won't get to try it. Meh. As long as it's back up and running by the time (if) I get there, it's fine. Batman was closed when I was there before, so still need the cred.

 

[ECG]

Actually, the Great America backwards chassis is still at SFGAm, the hardware was flipped and the eighth car from the old train was added so now it's running forwards. This is an entirely new pair of trains.

I don't know where you're getting your information from, but I suggest you check the facts before posting statements like that.
The chassis for Batman: The Ride Backwards cannot run forward. It's a specially designed chassis that Six Flags purchased and only runs for limited time in order to send it from park to park every year. B&M only built one of these chassis (so far), which is why Six Flags Great America and now Six Flags Magic Mountain can only run single train operations during the limited engagement. There has never been a "new pair of trains".
The backwards chassis is designed to hold seven pairs of seats and each park has to remove those seats from one of their forward facing chassis and install them on the backwards facing one, which is why the limited engagement is always at the beginning of the season and coaster is down for so long after the limited engagement while they put the seats back on their original chassis.
So the coaster at Six Flags Great America is using their original trains because the "hardware" cannot simply be flipped around. If they did that the seats wouldn't line up with the queue gates, which is one of the reasons that B&M had to design a new chassis for running the coaster backwards. If it were that easy, you would see other parks flipping their B&M inverts around as well. For other parks it isn't worth the coast to purchase the backwards chassis, but for Six Flags it made sense since it could be used at so many of their parks to revive interest in their relatively old Batman coasters and bring more guests into those parks again.