The Pirate Ship at Twinlakes in Melton Mowbray is one of those 'rites of passage' rides that some kids love and others look at in fear for years, without ever quite having the nerve to ride. Originally built by Zamperla in 1987, it's been a centrepiece...
At Garmendale, we work on some very interesting engineering projects and this latest one is no exception. It’s the first of four railway chassis refurbishment jobs we are undertaking. Garmendale made their name in their early years around 1980-1990 designing and building railway engines and chassis...
At Garmendale, we love theme park ride refurbishment, so when we were asked by Oakwood Theme Park to help them refurbish the trains on the Megafobia Roller Coaster, we literally jumped at the chance. Megafobia has been voted the UK’s number-one wooden rollercoaster numerous times since it...
The team from Garmendale will once again be at IAAPA 2018 in Florida. To give it its full title, the IAAPA Attractions Expo is the largest international trade show for the amusements and attractions industry. This year there will be over 1,100 exhibitors, who exhibit across...
Wayne Ford has joined Garmendale Theme Park Engineering as the Technical Project Manager. He has joined the business from Stage One UK, having been at WGH Transportation for over 21 years before that. Wayne, who is married with three young children is 43 and lives in...
When your team is growing, you need the offices to grow with you, so we took the opportunity whilst some of the team were away at EAS in Amsterdam last week to extend the design office to be double its original size. It won't be long...
The EAS Show is underway and the halls are busy with interested trade visitors and just a few consumers wanting to find out what's big and upcoming in the future of the theme park industry. Speaking to Kelvin Ensor, Garmendale's General Manager he said "The show feels much...
Once again we will be taking the team to RAI Amsterdam - one of our favourite locations for EAS to showcase our new and most popular ride systems. This year we will have three separate exhibits. All of which are new, and we think pretty special. The...
The White Rhino is one of the biggest and heaviest living, land-based animals in the world. The male weighs in at around 2,300kg (around the same as a new Range Rover). Their front horn can grow as long as 1500mm and when they start to...
Ascot Racecourse is one of the leading racecourses in the UK and hosts 26 days of top class racing, including nine Group 1 Flat Races. The course itself was founded in 1711 by Queen Anne, when the first race, "Her Majesty's Plate" took place with...
Joel Wright has joined the team as an Electrical Engineer. Joel, who is 24, lives in Long Eaton with his wife. With a father who is an electrician too, his training started very young, when he began helping out on sites, the day after he left...
We've been busy over the Christmas break and are well on the way to completing the design and construction of a new electrical and pneumatic test, repair and assembly area. It's another sign of the growth of the business that we have run out of clean working...
2016 was a very big year for Garmendale as the business grew and developed our range of rides for theme parks and attractions. Well, we're delighted to report in this 2017 review that this year has been even more successful and we have made further...
Last week (December 6th 2017) saw the launch of the 2018 Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering. It is a global £1 million prize that celebrates a ground-breaking innovation in engineering and aims to encourage younger people to enter the engineering industry. Much of the talk around...
It's approaching that time of year when the team are allowed to head home for a winter rest, so we wanted to let you know our closing times during December. Officially we close at 17.00 on Friday 22nd December and return fully refreshed and ready to...
One of the unusual machines we have in a quiet corner of the workshop is a vibratory tumbler. It's like a great big potato rumbler for metal parts and was designed and manufactured in Coventry, UK. Our man Dick who has refurbished the vibratory tumbler and...
To most people, welding may be seen as just one of those processes that happens when mechanical things are made. Wikipedia describe it as follows ‘Welding is a fabrication or sculptural process that joins materials, usually metals, by causing fusion.’ To some, welding may even be...
It's that time of year when the team head out to the sun of Florida for the 2017 IAAPA Attractions Expo. It's the biggest show of its kind anywhere in the world and some of the numbers are staggering. There will be 1,100 Exhibitors across 575,000...
Here at Garmendale, we are firm believers in the power of youth and the business has always invested in apprenticeships. Many of our key staff members started their life with Garmendale as fresh-faced apprentices, who with training, investment and ongoing effort from both sides have...
Tapping M10 holes in steel is something that every home engineering enthusiast has done. Most of us will have done it at school as part of our metalwork education. We may even own our very own and little-used tap and die sets. Mine sits at...
...This is a Garmendale Technical Manual. And when we do a technical manual for a client, as we do with all things, we like to do things properly. This is just one example of the manual for a ride we have recently completed the manufacture and...
EAS Berlin 2017 is over, next stop is Amsterdam. There's plenty of work to do in the meantime, but we will see you there. So let's review our week in Berlin. The show was superb. For us, the busiest stand we have had for a few years...
With our background in theme park engineering, we have talked a lot in the past about the lengths we go to in order to ensure a theme park ride is designed and built right. Because, as a business, we grew up maintaining rides first, we understand the...
We're all packed up and ready to go. On our way to Berlin for the Euro Attractions Show at the Messe Berlin Exhibition Center. The show runs from Tuesday 26th September through to Thursday 28th September. The Garmendale Stand is in Hall 18, Stand 117...
The Thursford Collection is a museum in Thursford, Norfolk. It was originally founded by George Cushing - a local man who built up the collection almost single handedly. In the late 1930's as steam engines were replaced by diesel and petrol power, Cushing began to...
In the last post about the shotgun gates, we showed you the shotgun gates for Florida being packed up, ready to be shipped. Before they left, they were FAT tested for over 11,000 cycles, which went fautlessly as you'd expect. Here's the video of them in action....
The shotgun gates for Orlando are finished, packed and ready to go. Work started towards the end of May and has progressed smoothly and all of the final FAT testing (Factory Acceptance Testing) has been completed too. The testing itself has been interesting and has produced some...
Once again we will be taking a team to EAS and hope to see you on the stand. You can find us in Hall 18, Stand 117. We will be showcasing our immersive tunnel range as well as showing the completed Vroomster Ride that's now in operation...
With all the changes in the theme park and attractions industry for more technology and faster, more scary rides, we have found at Garmendale, that one of our fastest growing areas for enquiries is for one of our very simplest rides, which is the Tractor...
Back in 2001, the local authority in Blackpool got all creative and commissioned the Manchester based Art Department to create a work of art for the South Shore area of the town. They appointed the sculptor Michael Trainor to design it for them who designed the world's...