Career in Rides

[rcoaster]

I've recently been planning on what I want to do in life, and after exploring different areas of interest, I find that I want to pursue a career in either ride engineering, designing, or something along those lines.

Just a quick note- I find this related to the Amusement Park Industry, so I put it in "General Coaster Talk" for that reason. Hopefully this hasn't been discussed, as I haven't seen anything from the search function.

So... I'm looking for help from the great enthusiasts or possibly people that are involved in my area of interest. I also hope to help others that are interested, seeing that the audience of the forum is generally young.

Do you guys think that entering such a career is plausible? I do have many ideas, and I'm interested in Physics and other sciences, after completing them in school. I don't know where to start now. Obviously get into a college with a great engineering program, which I am looking into. But I'm interested to participate in some internships or other programs from major companies. I have partially looked into Disney's Imagineer Program, but I don't really know how and if it would help someone with my interest. I wonder if companies such as Bolliger and Mabillard, Intamin, Vekoma, MACK, S & S, or many others have any type of internships that don't require settlement in other countries.

Hopefully, one day, I can start a successful ride manufacturing company, but I need to know where to start. I just want to try to make a dream like this a reality. I hope others are interested too, and I meet a few people with experience!

[BP317]

Do you guys think that entering such a career is plausible?

I want to pursue a career in either ride engineering, designing, or something along those lines.

This is plausible (sort of), theres even a few people on this board that are interested in it.

I wonder if companies such as Bolliger and Mabillard, Intamin, Vekoma, MACK, S & S, or many others have any type of internships that don't require settlement in other countries.

GCI has a few interns that have their own website http://www.greatcoastersinterns.com/ but this is only a couple people that are probably really intense engineering students. S&S wants their interns to speak chinese, any of the other companies I guarentee you will have to relocate countries for if any internships are available. Dont bother trying to contact B&M, they have a whole page added to their website to deter people from asking .

Be advised that "ride design" is very broad whichever aspect of it youd be doing is very difficult and takes a lot of school. Most people that want to be in it cant get into it. There are several types of engineers that it takes to make rides can do including structural engineering, electrical engineering, PLC programming, steel/woodworking, etc.

Id reccomend getting a job at a park as a ride maintenence worker (either mechanical, electrical, or control based on what field of engineering you want to go into) to get some experience working with rides. Go to a very good engineering school if you want a prayer and after college....get more education and try to network with people youve met at work and keep on top of all opportunities. Chances are very slim on actually becoming a ride designer, but with the right education and taking the opportunities its likely yourself a nice career in engineering for a theme park company.

[onyxhotel08]

You can always go work for Vekoma and see if they can resume working on Giant Inverted Boomerangs...

[zjohn1988]

I was supposed to take an Engineering, CAD job for Waveloch last year in California...

Get into a good engineering school and try to work at a theme park, as previously stated.

Walt Disney World's engineering program is Union and they offer a 4 year Apprenticeship program in Mechanical, Electrical, and HVAC/Plumbing.

The external hiring link for the WDW program is here

[Danhockey04]

I'm currently pursuing a job at Universal to move into ride design. I have graduate with a mechanical degree and will be going for a masters. So, I'll see if it all works out, if not, oh well.

By the way, they want you to have knowledge in all fields of the design process, not just one particular one, it helps when working with the other engineers. So don't focus on one aspect, you need to obtain them all. My only thing stopping me from getting the job now was PLC knowledge, I have some, but need more, hence why I'm pursuing a maintenance job to eventually go into ride design after my masters. It is not easy to get through engineering, especially at a tough school, takes a lot of work and time (way more than most fields)

[rcoaster]

Thanks for all the responses. I'll plan accordingly and wisely. Hopefully I'll get lucky and meet some helpful people during my life, and I'll just see how everything plays out.

[Luxornv]

When you get to college, take a serious look at the Disney College Program. I go to an engineering school now and one of my friends there did it a few years ago. He just graduated and was doing intern work for a company that is contracted to work for a few parks. I talked to him and he has done some work for Universal, helped design the power systems on Manta, and I can't remember what else. He now works for this company.

[rcoaster]

I was thinking about doing the Disney program. If I plan to attend University of IL or something similar, how would I be able to register for the program? I would love to do this type of internship.
On to engineering... I have not decided whether I'd like to pursue mechanical or structual engineering. Mechanical engineering would design trains and mechanisms on rides and coasters, while structual engineering would be more of designing the layout supports ride etc.
I only wish I can email someone big like Ron Toomer...

[monsterfan99]

I was thinking about doing the Disney program. If I plan to attend University of IL or something similar, how would I be able to register for the program? I would love to do this type of internship.
On to engineering... I have not decided whether I'd like to pursue mechanical or structual engineering. Mechanical engineering would design trains and mechanisms on rides and coasters, while structual engineering would be more of designing the layout supports ride etc.
I only wish I can email someone big like Ron Toomer...

With the Disney's College Program, remember most of it is food, shops, clean-up and rides work.

And Ron was still as sharp as someone his age could be earlier this year.

[rcoaster]

^Yeah, I saw him on the video of CoasterMania 2009 at CP.

As for the DCP... are there any programs for maintenance or such? I'm a physics and math fan, and it'd be great to put that together with the wonderful world of thrills.

It would be amazing if this career topic would gain more popularity with some important people from the theme park industry because it would be an informative read for the people that have similar interests as me. Thanks so much for all the help so far!

[Luxornv]

Monsterfan99 has it right, most of the Disney College Program starts you in either rides, clean up, food, or shops. It doesn't matter what you are going to school for, that's where they put you. I was assigned a custodial position, but I declined it because the whole thing really messed up other things for me.

I would recommend that you go into mechanical engineering (it's what I'm doing). That way if you don't make it into the amusement industry, you are still very versatile and can get a job doing almost anything else. Not to say you wouldn't be versatile as a structural engineer, but mechanical engineers get a much more broad education and you can move between different jobs easily.

As for getting into the Disney College Program, there will probably be notices around campus of when and where Disney will actually do a presentation. You say you plan on going to U of I, so there should be a presentation actually on the campus. Wait a few weeks after you get to school until you start looking. If you really want to know though, talk to career services or a counselor. I go to a much smaller school, so I had to go to another school to see the presentation. Before that, you're going to have to go to the website and put in an application; it's very basic, just contact info and previous job experience. Then you'll go to the presentation, they'll show you a few videos and answer questions for you and then sign you up for a phone interview. Someone from the resort will then call you for the scheduled interview and will talk to you for about 30 minutes. I'd advise you ask your room mate(s) to leave the room or at least be quiet, and have a bottle of water with you (my mouth gets dry when I'm nervous). Also make sure you have some paper in front of you to write things down as they talk to you. About 2 weeks after that, they'll send you something in the mail to let you know if you got the job and what job it is.

Based on what you posted, you seem a lot like me. I have always enjoyed math, and I really like physics as well. I'm going into my junior year at an engineering school, and I really like it too.

IM me if you want to talk more about this. I'm Luxorcc on AIM and Luxornv on Yahoo.

[zjohn1988]

don't become a CP