Mack Rides Opens German Factory During IAAPA Honors

Rust, Germany (IAAPA News) - Seldom does a roller coaster factory—brimming with patented technology—welcome guests to stroll the fabrication floor. The exception: attendees of IAAPA Honors.

Mack Rides opened the gates to their Waldkirch, Germany, production facility this week to bus full of attendees.

“It was an incredible experience. We got to go behind the scenes, into a factory that not many people get to see,” says Lena Lee, senior vice president of Universal Studios Japan.  

“We learned how rides are designed, conceptualized, and assembled.”

More than 45 attractions professionals who elected to participate in the EDUTour formed three groups that explored all corners of the facility. 

“We were proud so many from around the world came to our factory in Waldkirch,” shares Sascha Rigling, deputy sales manager at Mack Rides.

The first stop was the milling area, where solid blocks of steel are put into a drilling machine. After a 30-hour process of sculpting at high speeds, part of the roller coaster chasse emerges in one solid piece.

“Today, what we want to avoid is welding different elements found on the vehicle, because welding means the customer has to do non-destructive testing yearly that ensures the welding is okay,” explains Rigling. 

“With the milling process, we have one piece and we mill different elements for the vehicle with these milling machines.”

Attendees then moved into the track bending facility.  Here, long and straight piles are expertly bent to form the running rails of a coaster. These solid steel rails are turned and twisted before they await assembly in the welding area.

“I can’t tell you what we really do—or the process involved—because I think our process as a manufacturer is so advanced. And this guarantees the quality,” Rigling explains to IAAPA News. To protect those trade secrets, Rigling says Mack will only produce their rides in southwest Germany.

Meanwhile, in a corner of the factory, a robot arm—like those found on an automobile line—heats metal pipe, before pinching and cutting off loose ends. These pieces will soon form the connective spine found on Mack’s coaster track.

In the next room, the running rails are expertly welded to the track supports by a combination of humans and robots.

The full process and the equipment used are part of another highly secretive process.

“To make the process more automatic, you’ll find the brains behind the operation. We have very good people who do that,” says Christian von Elverfeldt, Mack’s chief executive officer.

For the past 245 years, Mack Rides has continually found ways to innovate. Today is no different, as von Elverfeldt says market pressures have led the company to develop more efficient ways to build products.  

Just behind the factory, Dennis Gordt, Mack’s head of track development and simulation, shared with attendees the process of how a new ride is ordered, designed, fabricated, delivered, installed, and commissioned. 

Often, the attendance of a park and rider throughput plays an important role in discussions.

“Capacity plays a quite an important role in how many people per hour can be on the ride,” Gordt says. 

For example, Voltron, Mack Ride’s new Stryker model coaster that opened at Europa-Park in 2024, has an hourly rider throughput of 1,600.  

Meanwhile, Gordt says there is one element that will always play a central role.  “The safety of our passengers is quite literally the most important element.”

Mack Rides has also created its own computer modeling software. Gordt demonstrated how the program allows Mack’s designers to twist, bend, and stretch track elements on a computer while working with operators during the design process.

“We’ve sat in those meetings, but to hear how the concepts come together was cool,” says Gina Claassen with Herschend.

Claassen was part of the team at Silver Dollar City who played a role in the opening of Time Traveler, a Mack spinning coaster that opened in 2018.

“Most of the time, the pieces arrive, and we put them together. You don’t get the see the pieces in the beginning of the process,” Claassen says.

“Seeing the raw material and how it goes through the machines … that was incredible.”

Attendees concluded their visit by enjoying a reception inside the childhood home of Dr. Roland Mack and Jürgen Mack. 

The storied home of family patriarch Franz Mack is in a picturesque setting with flowering trees in bloom behind the Waldkirch factory.

Still resting on their hooks inside the foyer: a hat and sweater belonging to the innovative ride designer.

Attendees enjoyed refreshments and appetizers inside the Mack family dining room and toured the basement’s rathskeller and drafting room, where Franz would often draw new ride concepts. 

His home office sits in the same condition as the late entrepreneur left it upon his passing in October 2010. 

“We left it as it was,” von Elverfeldt says, adding Franz would be proud that professionals from the industry he loved continued the tradition of gathering inside his home. “It was fun to host people who understand what we are doing,” von Elverfeldt concludes.