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 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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
The sharp-eyed amongst you will have noticed that we have been quietly developing our range of ride systems for theme parks and attractions over the last few years. There are other new rides in development as we speak, but as an update, here's a sneaky...
As part of the planned growth of Garmendale, we have now joined the Blooloop Directory. Blooloop describes itself as 'The online resource for professionals working in the visitor attractions sector" Which to us, means that if you work in the theme park, museums or attractions...
The Design and Engineering teams here have been hard at work with a brand new custom designed gating system for a Florida Park. We’re not allowed to unveil who it’s for yet, but rest assured, it’s one you will have heard of. The gating system is...
We have just come back from the Themed Entertainment Association SATE Conference that was held at Beaulieu - The home of the National Motor Museum. The annual SATE Conference was created back in 2007 by the TEA to foster professional dialog about the methodology of Experience...
The brand new Go Jetters Vroomster ride at CBeebies Land is now officially open. It's also been featured in a great new TV advertisement which you can see here. The ride has been designed, manufactured and installed by our team here at Garmendale and been featured...
The Pirate Ship at Skegness Pleasure Beach is a firm family favourite that has been thrilling (and scaring) riders for many years. The ride was originally built by Huss Rides and it's one of ten or so that are still operating in Europe. You can see it...