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Windham - Ongoing Lift Issues - Anyone else frustrated?

Magna999

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Growing frustration from seasons pass holders and guests paying premium prices for very poor lift experience this season. December had full rope evacuation on A lift, to which the resort claims new planetary installed but ongoing problems continue. 30 minuet stoppages on A are Becoming routine. G-lift has been down several times as well in recent weeks/starts stops with what appears to be a pneumatic leak. Parents concerned about lack of information from the mountain and the constant thought of will I get stuck on the lifts is becoming a major theme here for parents and their kids. Sadly, Seems that the band-iAd approach continues for lift operations. No material information coming from owners/mgmt on long term lift strategy. Why do the resorts on east coast limit transparency on lift issues unlike their peers out west like Park City and others who openly dialog and forum about lift maintenances and strategy?
 

benski

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I went to Windham once last year, and found the snow making quality, which was going threw-out the day awful, despite prime temperatures. My I damaged a credit card that day scraping ice off my skis. also noticed the main Express quad, only runs at 500 feet per minuet. I think thats the same speed as Sugarbush's Valley house and left than half there GMX lift. The food was not good and over priced. On the plus, i got there at 11 and parked 2 rows back from the lodge for free. It was a Friday in December.

Also Sugarbush and Magic's owners both participate in this forum. Mount Snow also has a representative. We are very grateful for there presents.
 

AndrewLamp

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I am very frustrated with Windham Mountain. I am a season pass holder so I ski the mountain every weekend with my family. A lift and G lift are constantly stopping. We were on the lift for the rope evacuation in the sub zero tempratures. After they lowered us down they took our names and phone numbers, but never followed up with a call or even an email. I thought things would get better, but they are still the same. A lift stops or runs at half speed all the time and G is not much better. My kids are starting to get scared as everyone jokes about the lifts. I guess the joke is on me since I paid lots of money for season passes.
 

kingslug

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Im a maintenance engineering manager at The World Trade Center..
Ita all about prventative maintenance and replacing parts before they fail. If you dont its called reactive maintenance which soon leads to catastrophic failure. If ski resort owners dont know this by now..well..they are simply not doing the right thing thinking they will save money. Wrongo...reactive maintenance can cost upwards of 400% more than preventative. Try that with your car..dont change the oil or brakes..see what happens.
 

Magna999

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Seems K lift at Windham is also having issues. Down now.

Im a maintenance engineering manager at The World Trade Center..
Ita all about prventative maintenance and replacing parts before they fail. If you dont its called reactive maintenance which soon leads to catastrophic failure. If ski resort owners dont know this by now..well..they are simply not doing the right thing thinking they will save money. Wrongo...reactive maintenance can cost upwards of 400% more than preventative. Try that with your car..dont change the oil or brakes..see what happens.

What someone should expect when they place themselves and their kids into the lift operations hands. I don’t know what the issues are but Windham needs fix their lift issues not just keep patching with as little dollars as possible.
 

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cdskier

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Without knowing the specific details of what has been breaking and what was done, it is hard to say for sure it is a lack of preventative maintenance or just bad luck. Sometimes you do everything you should on schedule and things still break. I know of situations where motors were rebuilt and should have had x amount of years left but then suddenly blow out well short of the expected lifespan. Should mountains simply put new parts in every few years? No. You follow industry best practices and expect that to work. Now if a mountain chooses to ignore manufacturer recommendations and best practices, the responsibility for failures at that point is fully on the mountain. Need details in this situation to know which is the case.

I don't particularly agree with the issue of lift maintenance transparency being an east coast vs west coast thing. It is an individual resort thing. As pointed out in this thread, there are several east coast mountains that are active in these discussions here and on other forums.
 

Magna999

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Preventative

Without knowing the specific details of what has been breaking and what was done, it is hard to say for sure it is a lack of preventative maintenance or just bad luck. Sometimes you do everything you should on schedule and things still break. I know of situations where motors were rebuilt and should have had x amount of years left but then suddenly blow out well short of the expected lifespan. Should mountains simply put new parts in every few years? No. You follow industry best practices and expect that to work. Now if a mountain chooses to ignore manufacturer recommendations and best practices, the responsibility for failures at that point is fully on the mountain. Need details in this situation to know which is the case.

I don't particularly agree with the issue of lift maintenance transparency being an east coast vs west coast thing. It is an individual resort thing. As pointed out in this thread, there are several east coast mountains that are active in these discussions here and on other forums.

Your correct and wasn’t suggesting it an easy coast west coast thing, but the point is some resorts choose to educate and provide total transparency on lift ops, maintenance and planning. I cited Park city because when they had issues with their C-Tec lifts they were very transparent to the pass holders and published letters from manufacturer and resort ops etc. Same thing can be said for some other easy coast resorts also. It just seems that certain resorts tend to limit information (hunter and Windham). It’s gotten to the point where people at Windham expect the A lift and G lift to have multiple stoppages as a routine factor in a days skiing. Clearly some issues going on but no clarity given publicly and their own staff raises concerns under their breath.
 

thetrailboss

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Growing frustration from seasons pass holders and guests paying premium prices for very poor lift experience this season. December had full rope evacuation on A lift, to which the resort claims new planetary installed but ongoing problems continue. 30 minuet stoppages on A are Becoming routine. G-lift has been down several times as well in recent weeks/starts stops with what appears to be a pneumatic leak. Parents concerned about lack of information from the mountain and the constant thought of will I get stuck on the lifts is becoming a major theme here for parents and their kids. Sadly, Seems that the band-iAd approach continues for lift operations. No material information coming from owners/mgmt on long term lift strategy. Why do the resorts on east coast limit transparency on lift issues unlike their peers out west like Park City and others who openly dialog and forum about lift maintenances and strategy?

Where do you see "western resorts" talking about lift maintenance and strategy? I haven't seen anything.
 

Magna999

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Where do you see "western resorts" talking about lift maintenance and strategy? I haven't seen anything.

Park city had some major issues with Dopp CTEC back is mid 2000’s and they were very transparent with the community around the issues and how they were addressing the entire lift fleet to modernize. Also, there are some great examples of east coast resorts sharing background around lift problems, fixes and frankly disclosure. That’s missing from resorts like Windham and Hunter.

Here is a good example: http://www.sugarloaf.com/liftsafety/articles/chairlift-icing
 

thetrailboss

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Park city had some major issues with Dopp CTEC back is mid 2000’s and they were very transparent with the community around the issues and how they were addressing the entire lift fleet to modernize. Also, there are some great examples of east coast resorts sharing background around lift problems, fixes and frankly disclosure. That’s missing from resorts like Windham and Hunter.

Here is a good example: http://www.sugarloaf.com/liftsafety/articles/chairlift-icing

I was going to say Sugarloaf...because they have had two very high profile accidents.

But I did not know about PCMR. Interesting.
 

FBGM

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Dana I think is the lift maintenance manager there. He's a douche. This has nothing to do with maintenance tho.

Lift maintenance across ski areas country wide is a nightmare. The preventative maintenance, repairs, reports, checking, etc is done different at all places. Most lift mechanics are clueless. The old generation of lift mechanics are out or on their way. The new wave is clueless. Most resorts are lucky if they have one senior guy that knows his stuff. Resorts also pay peanuts. When you pay your skilled senior lift guy $18/hr why would he not leave and use his skills at a non ski area for salary wages.

There will be a huge lift accident at some point. With numerous fatalities. And this will come crashing down. And regulations will tighten. Training and skills will be had. Pay will increase. And your ticket price will follow
 

JimG.

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Dana I think is the lift maintenance manager there. He's a douche. This has nothing to do with maintenance tho.

Lift maintenance across ski areas country wide is a nightmare. The preventative maintenance, repairs, reports, checking, etc is done different at all places. Most lift mechanics are clueless. The old generation of lift mechanics are out or on their way. The new wave is clueless. Most resorts are lucky if they have one senior guy that knows his stuff. Resorts also pay peanuts. When you pay your skilled senior lift guy $18/hr why would he not leave and use his skills at a non ski area for salary wages.

There will be a huge lift accident at some point. With numerous fatalities. And this will come crashing down. And regulations will tighten. Training and skills will be had. Pay will increase. And your ticket price will follow

Wow dude, you make me not want to go skiing anymore. I think some of what you say is very true, especially the part about wages and the exodus of older maintenance talent.
 

kingslug

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Its true, hell even when you pay a ton of money you don't get what you you used to get. The old days are gone. How many people do you see out in their driveway fixing up the car. Its a throwaway society. Gone are the days you went into the basement and fixed whatever was broken. I grew up in that. My father was the chief jet mechanic/inspector for The Flying Tigers. I grew up watching him and continued with it. Now, I can't hire people who can fix very much. Some can because they want to and like it, others are in it just for the money. Its shocking that a contraption that carries people in chairs high above a frozen surface in sub zero temperatures could be so poorly maintained. If it moves, spins, goes up and down, its going to wear out.
 

Magna999

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At least Hunter is communicating their lift issues - Windham needs to do same -

Its true, hell even when you pay a ton of money you don't get what you you used to get. The old days are gone. How many people do you see out in their driveway fixing up the car. Its a throwaway society. Gone are the days you went into the basement and fixed whatever was broken. I grew up in that. My father was the chief jet mechanic/inspector for The Flying Tigers. I grew up watching him and continued with it. Now, I can't hire people who can fix very much. Some can because they want to and like it, others are in it just for the money. Its shocking that a contraption that carries people in chairs high above a frozen surface in sub zero temperatures could be so poorly maintained. If it moves, spins, goes up and down, its going to wear out.

Dear Season Passholder,

The past week and a half has been a whirlwind for us here. As we were ramping up for President’s Weekend, one of our worst fears occurred: the Kaatskill Flyer went down due to what ended up being an electrical issue. At that time, F-lift had also been down due to electrical issues.

Traditionally when we post updates to social media, we summarize and condense the nitty gritty details. This allows us to provide you with accurate updates in the most timely manner possible while still being sufficiently informative. We hoped that our guests trusted that we were doing everything in our power to fix these issues as soon as possible because hey, we live for the winter season, we live for skiing and riding, and this is what we all do and love. However, we saw that a number of you voiced your frustrations, and for that we are sorry.

With that said, we are now providing you with all the details regarding the series of unfortunate events that unraveled as we worked toward fixing the lift issues. We hope that this clears up any misinformation, rumors, and ill feelings that you might have. Ultimately, we hope you understand that while you were frustrated as a skier or rider, we were also frustrated – because just when we thought we were taking two steps forward, we ended up a few steps back.

Before reading the timelines below, please note that we’ll be using the term “drive” often. “Drive,” in this case, is a major part of the lift that controls many functions of the motor including starting, stopping, converting electricity, and controlling the speed. “Panel” is another term we’ll use. Our drive unit is comprised of 4 “plug-in” panels, each weighing 375lbs (unfortunately not a spare part that we can simply stock on site).


TIMELINE FOR THE KAATSKILL FLYER:
At approximately 3:45pm last Tuesday when the Flyer went down, we discovered that one of the panels within the Flyer’s drive unit stopped working.
We immediately contacted the support team for our lift manufacturer. They made arrangements to ship a spare panel to us from Colorado. The part had to be transported to the airport from Breckenridge, so unfortunately the part could not be shipped until Wednesday evening.
Thursday morning we received the part. Upon plugging it in, another panel blew.
We called the manufacturer and they got another part ready to ship to Albany International Airport Thursday night.
Friday morning, our Lift Operations Manager was at Albany International at 6am, only to be told that the airplane never left Colorado due to mechanical issues.
We then had the manufacturing company put the part on another plane and had it delivered first class so that it would arrive Saturday morning.
Saturday morning, our Lift Operations Manager headed back to Albany International and picked up the part.
When we plugged in the second panel Saturday morning, it was not communicating properly with the first replacement panel. By this time, the president of the manufacturing company, electricians from the manufacturing company, and our master electricians from Peak Resorts were all on site to work through this.
After working through the night, they were able to figure out a solution to get the motor running for Sunday (at half capacity to ensure the motor ran as smoothly as possible).
A third replacement panel arrived Wednesday. The part has been installed and the Flyer is now back to running at full capacity.

TIMELINE FOR F-LIFT:
Over this past summer, we completely replaced F-Lift’s motor and were confident this would resolve the issues it had had in the past.
During the current season, when we realized that replacing the motor did not in fact resolve issues with F-Lift, the drive engineer for the lift company replaced several components and believed it was now ready to go.
After this was not enough, we pulled the motor out yet again and rebuilt it.
This did not work. We sent it to the motor company again, at which time they tested the motor and CONFIRMED it was working properly.
Upon receiving it back, it failed again, which lead us to believe it could possibly be the drive. We asked the drive engineer to look into it and he confirmed that the drive itself was also working properly.
As of now, the motor engineer and the drive engineer have been in direct contact for the last week. They will provide us with an update when they figure out what the issue is. We will then move forward with their recommendation on how to fix F-Lift.


We’ll say this again – it’s been a whirlwind. While we keep spare lift parts stocked on site and are fortunate to employ numerous highly skilled mechanics and electricians, sometimes issues arise that are out of our hands. When that happens, we do whatever we can to resolve the issue as soon as possible. In this case, it was over-nighting parts, bringing in specialists from the manufacturer, and waiting for their recommendations and instruction.

We are a company that values our customers and strives to create the best experience possible. We have been since 1959 and continue to be as part of the Peak Resorts family. To see our guests dissatisfied makes us feel defeated, especially when we know we are doing everything in our power to fix the issue. Now that the Flyer has been fixed and we continue to work with engineers on F-Lift, we are focused on moving forward and ensuring we continue this season on a high note; we hope you will do the same.


Thank you for taking the time to read this and for your understanding.

Sincerely,

Russ Coloton
GM & President, Hunter Mountain
 

Magna999

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Windham makes big announcement today. A base-to-summit six-passenger chairlift is coming to Windham Mountain in the Catskill Mountains of New York. The mile-long Doppelmayr system will replace the Whistler triple, a 1983 VonRoll triple with a ten-plus minute ride. A parallel detachable quad called Whirlwind, built by Garaventa CTEC in 1993, will remain in place this summer and beyond. Windham also revealed today it will launch RFID ticketing across its seven lifts next season and Doppelmayr now has at least a dozen lifts to build in the United States and Canada this year.

They are making the right move...
 
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