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Ferris wheel

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A portable Ferris wheel in England
This illustration, from U.S. patent 1,354,436, depicts a variant of the Ferris Wheel with sliding gondolas. It was built at Coney Island in the 1920s, and still operates at Deno's Wonder Wheel Park. A replica of this Ferris wheel can be found in Disney's California Adventure theme park
A large permanently mounted Ferris wheel in Chongqing, China

A Ferris wheel (or, more commonly in the UK, big wheel) is an amusement ride consisting of an upright wheel with passenger gondolas suspended from the rim.

History

It is named after George Washington Gale Ferris, Jr., who designed a 75-meter (250-foot) wheel for the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois in 1893. It was designed as a rival to the Eiffel Tower, the centerpiece of the 1889 Paris exhibition. This first wheel weighed 2200 tons and could carry 2160 persons at a time; Its axle was the largest piece of steel yet cast at that time. At 26 stories it was four stories taller than the tallest skyscraper in the world—also in Chicago—but only a quarter of the Eiffel Tower's height. It was reused at the St. Louis World's Fair.

Another famous Ferris wheel with a height of 65 meters, dating back to 1897, is the Riesenrad in Vienna's Prater in the second district of Leopoldstadt - see also World's Fair.

London, UK had its very own 'Gigantic Wheel' built at Earls Court in 1895, which was modelled on the original one in Chicago. This wheel stayed in service until 1906 by which time it had carried over 2.5 million passengers. It was built by a young Australian engineer named Gareth Watson and was the first of over 200 ferris wheels that he built world-wide.

At 212 feet (65 meters), The Texas Star at Fair Park is the largest ferris wheel in the Western Hemisphere. The wheel opened in 1985 and has a maximum capacity of 260 persons. Sky Dream Fukuoka in Fukuoka, Japan, at 112 meters in diameter and 120 meters from ground to top, is the largest Ferris wheel in the world.

The earliest ancestor of the Ferris wheel is the Ups-and-Downs, a crude, hand-turned device, which dates back at least to the 17th century and is still in use in some parts of the world.

Observation wheels

Some people consider Ferris wheels to be a distinct category from observation wheels, of which the London Eye is currently the largest example in the world. Although they are very similar, they differ in a some minor technical respects, most notably in that the passenger cars are not suspended from the wheel's circumference but are mounted on its exterior. This requires them to be stabilised mechanically, making observation wheels a more technically complex form of the Ferris wheel.


Double and Triple Wheels

In the mid to late 1970's, coaster giant Intamin AG invented a new twist on the common ferris wheel, using long arms to hold the massive wheels, they created a way to load and unload ferris wheels quicker. In 1976, 2 Sky Whirls opened at Marriott's Great America (IL, CA) and were the first triple wheels. One was also installed at Paramount's Kings Island in Ohio. Today, none of them operate.

See also

Transportable Ferris-Wheels in Germany

Name Owner/Location Manufacteurer Number of cabins and seats / Number of Spokes / Total height Prime built up at / Prime year shown Remarks
Amore Rad Göbel / Worms Nauta-Bussink (NL) 24 x 6 / 24 / 33m ? ?
Around the World Cornelius, Otto / Wallenhorst Mondial (NL) 36 x 6 / 18 / 50m Brockum / November 1997
Bayrisches Riesenrad Willenborg / München Schwarzkopf (D) 40 x 10 / 20 / 5?m ? / 1979
Bellevue Bruch, Oscar / Andernach Nauta-Bussink (NL) 42 x ? / 21 / 56m
Caesar's Wheel Ludwig Landwermann & Daniela Henschel / ? Mondial (NL) 26 x 6 / 26 / 33m
Circus Wheel Rosai, München Nauta-Bussink (NL)) 24 x 6 / 24 / 33m ? / 2005
Colossus Göbel / Worms Mondial (NL) 26 x 6 / 3?m ?
Columbia Rad Kleuser / Dortmund Mondial (NL) 26 x 6 / 26 / 33m ? / 1989
Europa-Rad Hanstein / Bremen Nauta-Bussink (NL) 24 x 6 / 24 / 33m ? / ?
Europa-Rad Kipp, W. / Bonn Nauta-Bussink (NL) 42 x 6 / 42 / 5?m ? / ?
Europa-Rad Schieck, Sebastian / Weberstedt Nauta-Bussink (NL) 24 x 6 / 24 / 33m Bad Salzungen / Juni 1999
Europa-Rad Schmidt, Rolf / Stuttgart Nauta-Bussink (NL) 36 x 6 / 36 / 5?m ? / 1990
Golden Wheel Jost / Worms Nauta-Bussink (NL) 24 x 6 / 24 / 3?m ? / ?
Jubilee Rad Müller / Chemnitz Nauta-Bussink (NL) 30 x 6 / 30 / 44m ? / 1996
Jupiter Kipp, W. / Bonn Nauta-Bussink (NL) 36 x 6 / 36 / 5?m ? / 1993
Jupiter 2 Kipp, W. / Bonn Nauta-Bussink (NL) 30 x 6 / 30 / 44m ? / 1998
Liberty Wheel Gormanns / ? van der Honing und Knijpstra (NL) 26 x 6 / 26 / 38m ? / ?
Moulin Rouge Burghardt-Kleuser / Dortmund Mondial (NL) 36 x 6 / 18 / 50m Dortmund? / 2003
Moulin Rouge Wolters-Domke/ Berlin? Mondial (NL) 32 x 6 / ? / 50m ? / ?
Movie Star Henschel, Peter und Kerstin, Bremen? Mondial (NL) 26 x 6 / 26 / 38m Pinneberg / 2005
Münchner Riesenrad Pötzsch, Paula / München Nauta-Bussink (NL) 24 x 6 / 24 / 33m ? / ?
Münchner Riesenrad Willenborg / München Mondial (NL) 32 x 6 / ? / 44m ? / ?
Original Berliner Riesenrad Lorenz / Berlin Mondial (NL) 26 x 6 / 26 / 33m ? / ?
Orion 2 Drliczek, Michael / Führt ? 18 x ? / ? / ?m ? / ?
Riesenrad Feldmann, Werner / Hennef/Sieg ? (D) 12 x 4 / ? / ? m ? / ?
Riesenrad Schubert, Bernd / Seifhennersdorf Nauta Bussink (NL) ? / ? / ?m 1992? / ?
Riesenrad Steiger / Bad Oeynhausen Kocks (D) 42 x ? / ? / 60m ? / ? Größtes transportables Riesenrad der Welt
Riesenrad Willenborg / München Gerstlauer (D) 36 x 6 / ? / 55m Lippstadter Herbstwoche / 1997
Riesenrad Wilhelm, Klaus / Hannover? Vekoma (NL) 36 x 6 / 36 / 48m ? / ?
Royal Bavarian Wheel Jost / Worms Nauta-Bussink (NL) 36 x 6 / 36 / 5?m ? / ?
Russische Schaukel Koppenhöfer, Herbert & Simon, Edith / München? Franz Gundelwein (D) 12 x ? / 12 / 14m ? / ?
Schuberts Riesenrad Schubert, Bernd / Seifhennersdorf Julius Bernhard Rössger / Waldheim 10 x 4 / 10 / 13 m 1902 / ?
Star of Berlin Lorenz / Berlin Mondial (NL) 26 x 6 / 26 / 33m ? / ?
Wonder Wheel Bruch, Willy und Schneider, Thomas / Düsseldorf Nauta-Bussink (NL) 30 x 6 / 30 / 44m ? / April 1995
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