Many newer roller coasters have an unpredictable start, immediately launching off quickly, instead of making that gradual climb up a hill before sending us on a terrific series of drops and hills. This new launch style roller coaster mainly uses magnets to achieve quick acceleration at the beginning of the roller coaster ride.

The type of magnets used in a roller coaster may vary, but the roller coaster depends upon both the negative and positive abilities of magnets. The quick launch of a roller coaster is often due to magnetic propulsion. This relies on magnets repelling rather than attracting one another. Estimates with very strong magnets suggest such propulsion could send a roller coaster up to 100 mph in a matter of seconds.

When one attempts to put magnets together that don’t attract, they push off against each other. While usual household magnets don’t have that much strength, one can still feel a push away from each magnet, almost as if they are trying to escape from each other. Combine strong magnets with a roller coaster and one develops an efficient way to launch a roller coaster forward quickly.

Additionally, a roller coaster may also rely on magnetic braking, where magnets, which attract each other gradually, slow down a roller coaster. These brakes tend to require less replacement than ordinary roller coaster brakes, and are a cost saving as well as energy saving device.

Often magnets on a roller coaster are controlled through automated systems. When propulsion is desired, magnets with different polarities may push down against the sides of the track to make contact with magnets with opposite polarities. When attraction is needed, magnets placed along the track gradually slow the coaster down.

The first roller coaster to use magnetic propulsion is the Flight of Fear, in Australia. Other parks have quickly copied this roller coaster, completed in 1997. Millennium Force, built in 2000 at Cedar Point, a popular theme park in Sandusky, Ohio, was the first roller coaster to use magnetic brakes. Magnetic braking is now so popular that it is employed on almost all newly built or designed roller coasters. Magnetic propulsion is hugely popular, and is employed on many super or hypercoasters.