How Do Rollercoasters Stay on the Track?

Question

I don't want to sound stupid but how do the rollercoasters stay on the track, while doing loops and stuff like that?

Answer 1

either magnets or just the speed. If you were to make a loop-d-loop and slide a hot wheels at it as hard as you can, it would stay on. It's weird.

Answer 2

The same way that the water stays in a bucket if you pour some in and then swing it around and around. Its the centripical force or somethin like that.

Answer 3

For the steel-tube designs, there are wheels on three sides of the guide tubes. Thus they could (theoretically) hang upside down from their guide rail tubes.

For wooden ones, if they don't have wheels on three sides of the guide rails, it's because the momentum of the coasters is calculated and compared against the acceleration of gravity. And it's set up so that at the speeds the coaster can reach it can never rise off the track.

These calculations are second-year-physics kind of stuff or easier.  

Answer 4

Actually they are both in a way wrong .

coasters have wheels on both sides of the bar

and the first drop or launch speed detirmines how fast it goes. like a chinese yo yo.

send me an email and i will show u the detail pictures : [e-mail]

God Bless

Answer 5

Almost all types of coaster uses a three wheel locking system and each with their own name: Guide Wheel, Road Wheel and Upstop Wheel (AKA the underfriction wheel- the main wheel to keep the coaster from jumping the track).

Next time you ride a coaster, look closely at the 3 wheel locking system.  That's is what keeping the coaster securely on the track.  Even if you stop upside down, the upstop wheels are designed to uphold the pressure.

Answer 6

its just because it goes fast

so if it broke down in the middle of a loop your out of luck