Ride Profile: The Flash Speed Force

Ride Type: Flat Ride

Manufacturer: Mack Rides
Model/Style: Musik Express
Year Built: 1974

One of the hot new attractions added to Magic Mountain in 1974 was a Mack Rides Musik Express called Himalaya. Known by many different names from multiple manufacturers, the Musik Express is a staple found at amusement parks and carnivals all over the world. It consists of 20 cars that seats up to three people each. The cars are connected to each other and travel in an undulated circle up to 12 revolutions per minute. It’s called a Musik Express because it started out with pulsating lights and loud music blaring during the ride, adding to the excitement. Many operators still run them that way, but not all.

The Himalaya kept the same name from 1974 to 1986. In 1987, the area in which it was located got a makeover as Back Street and the ride was renamed to Subway. In 1994, a major new roller coaster called Batman: The Ride opened up and the entire area transformed from Back Street into Gotham City. Subway was renamed again and was now known as ACME Atom Smasher, a name it kept until 2005 when it was shortened to just Atom Smasher. In 2010, the entire Gotham City area was closed and began yet another major transformation. In 2011, the entire area was unveiled as DC Universe and what was formerly known as Atom Smasher was now The Flash: Speed Force.

It’s hard to miss this ride as you enter DC Universe because it’s one of the two rides that flank the midway on your way in. It also doesn’t hurt that it now has a much more flashy paint job than it has had in many years, no pun intended:

As part of the new DC Universe, the ride is themed to the super-hero known as The Flash, considered to be the fastest man alive. The entrance is located just under the sign:

This is the main entrance:

Looking back towards the entrance, you can see that the queue is nothing more than a ramp that makes its way up to the loading area. There is a gate where you see the guy standing and the ride operator’s station is located just on the other side of the gate:

Signs up on the wall give some background information on how The Flash came to be:

This one kind of explains what the Speed Force is:

This next one makes me laugh every time I see it. It highlights some of The Flash’s arch enemies known as The Rogues. However, there is a major typo on the sign and it reads “The Rouges.” This translates to “The Reds”, so if you really want to stretch the imagination, you can just think of all of his villains as communists. Seriously, though, how does a mistake like that happen and why hasn’t the park fixed it yet:

The cars are basically just a bench seat that seats up to three people. The centrifugal force will force everyone outwards, so make sure the largest person is sitting on the very outside. Never put a child on the outside because you will crush them:

This is what the cars look like facing forward. Nice diamond plating for your feet:

When the ride is over, you exit on the opposite side from where you went in:

For the change from Gotham City to DC Universe, this ride was completely stripped down and refurbished to like new condition. This next photo shows the underlying mechanics of the ride. The 20 cars just run along an outside rail, connected to a center spindle, rising and falling at different heights as the ride operator manually controls the speed of the ride. The ride is powered by an electric motor in the center that can rotate the cars forward or backwards at equal speed:

It was in really rough shape before the refurbishment, but it looks and runs great now. You would never know that this ride was almost 40 years old: