wiegand.maelzer, a leading German waterslide and attraction provider, is celebrating the success of the first SlideWheel installation at Chimelong.
The ground breaking new waterslide was opened to the public on 1 April 2018.
The SlideWheel is the world´s first rotating waterslide.  The innovative design was inspired by the suggestion of an 8-year-old Swiss boy.
wiegand.maelzer developed a number of concepts before coming up with the final design which is “a beautiful symmetric star like shape of a tube with the brilliant advantage of both start and exit being located in the same horizontal axis”.
The SlideWheel is 24m tall, weighing 160 tons and is equipped with 2.7m diameter fiberglass elements, four friction drives, three conveyor belts for raft handling and starting procedure.
A full-scale prototype was built in the company’s facility in Germany before delivery to the first customer: Chimelong Waterpark in Guangzhou China. After four months of installations and commissioning on site, the water ride opened on time and has proved to be a popular addition to the waterpark.
The SlideWheel experience is unique. Riders site in a circular four-person raft and experience zero gravity and a loss of orientation as the slide turns over five swinging sections. The wheel rotates twice each minute and the slide length is 140m with the back and forth motion creating a ride length of 260-300m.
The ride capacity is one raft every 30 seconds (480p/h), with the ride lasting 90 seconds inside the SlideWheel followed by 20 seconds of a long Big River ride to the landing pool.
The SlideWheel is also fitted with 80 LED washers and 620 LED dots to provide a spectacular night time light show.
Three more SlideWheel installations are planned in 2019; two in China and one in Poland.
