Looking Like a Million Bucks : Landmarks: Giant Dipper almost ready to roll after nearly a decade of effort.

Back on the Fourth of July, 1925, people flocked to Mission Beach for a chance to feel the sea air rip through their hair as they zoomed along the tracks of a new demon roller coaster, the Giant Dipper.

On that inaugural day, a 16-year-old named Les Hamm got the ride of his life.

Now, more than 65 years later, the 81-year-old Hamm will do it again when the Giant Dipper is let loose for its grand reopening, following a $1.2-million restoration project by San Diego Seaside Co.

“It’s the only roller coaster I’ve ever been on in my life. I’m not scared of it,� said Hamm, a retired photographer who lives in Santee.

Under the blaze of the early-afternoon sun, construction workers are hurrying along the 2,600 feet of wood-and-steel track, pounding in the last nails and spreading on more than 1,000 gallons of pink, green and white paint, the new signature colors of the Giant Dipper in Belmont Park, which will reopen sometime during the first week of August.

Coaster restorers have taken more than a few phone calls about the track being painted pink. But a little neighborhood disagreement on the color scheme doesn’t have them bothered.

“It’s different, it stands out,� said Tim Cole, assistant manager of the Seaside Co., the group paying for the renovation work.

Because of a lease dispute with the city, the Giant Dipper has been derailed since 1976 and faced the threat of demolition as recently as 1982. But a volunteer army of roller coaster buffs, calling themselves the Save the Coaster Committee, won a three-year lease on the land from the city and were given a chance to renovate the structure at Mission Boulevard and West Mission Bay Drive.

The committee first got custody of the coaster in 1982 when it was donated by William Evans, who also owned the nearby Bahia Hotel.

With the slowly deteriorating ride on its hands, the committee raised about $250,000 in donations and started to give the Giant Dipper--considered by some more of a giant neighborhood eyesore--its much-needed overhaul.

“We spent lots of our weekend time with scrapers in one hand and paintbrushes in another,� said Cole, who said he has been working to save the coaster for about nine years.

But a passion for roller coasters and a desire to ward off the wrecking ball weren’t enough to keep paying the bills, and the Save the Coaster Committee soon fell behind schedule. The city suggested it get some help.

A Northern California-based roller coaster operator, the Santa Cruz Seaside Co., formed a joint venture with an amusement-equipment manufacturer to obtain a 31-year lease from the city to manage the coaster. After a 1987 inspection of the ride, the San Diego Seaside Co. was established, and the heavy-duty renovation work began.

Santa Cruz Seaside Co. operates the Santa Cruz Giant Dipper, one of only two seaside coasters in the West--San Diego’s Giant Dipper is the other--wood frame ancestors of today’s twisted metal, high-tech, high-speed contraptions.

The San Diego coaster is in the final stages of restoration--virtually a mirror image of the Dipper as it was in the ‘20s, but with some ‘90s features added.

All of the track has been replaced, along with all 28,973 bolts and much of the Douglas fir framework. A new concrete foundation has been poured for better support.

If not for damage caused while the bolts were being replaced, much more of the original wood could have been used, restorers say. About 90,000 of the 300,000 board-feet in the framework have been replaced.

“We had to replace all the bolts, so we had to take them all out,� Cole said. “In banging out old bolts, we splintered the wood when we pounded them out. Wood doesn’t age like people age.�

A new 24-seat train that complies with modern safety requirements will also be added. The six-car steel and fiberglass train will whip riders around a half-mile of track, take them down 13 drops and hit a top speed of 45 m.p.h. during what restorers promise will be a two-minute, hair-raising ride.

“It’s not that big, but it’s compact. This ride has a lot of personality,� said the 29-year-old Cole, who hasn’t ridden the coaster since his 15th birthday.

What the Giant Dipper might lack in speed and height--the track is 71 feet up at its highest point--it compensates for in history. During a ceremony last July 4, the coaster claimed its spot in history along with such landmarks as Mission San Diego de Alcala and the Hotel del Coronado when it was designated a national historic landmark by the National Park Service.

When the coaster does open for business, organizers are hoping for a reciprocal relationship with Belmont Park, the retail shopping center next to the coaster that opened in September and is about 80% leased.

In fact, officials on both sides are banking on it.

“We probably wouldn’t have done it if the shopping center hadn’t been there. It was a real blighted area,� said Ed Hutton, president of San Diego Seaside Co.

Before the retail center was built, the site was mostly empty space with a few scattered remnants of the run-down Mission Beach Park.

Belmont Park developers are striving for a balance of stores and restaurants in the shopping center to attract both tourists and locals, and the coaster may help.

“Obviously the coaster will be a natural draw. We’re pretty closely oriented on the property, so we need to work together,� said Skip White, executive vice president of Belmont Park Associates, developer of the retail center.

A grand reopening celebration is being planned for Belmont Park this fall, once the coaster has been up and running for a while, White said.

Work crews are pushing to finish the electrical wiring, put in the last stretch of track and get the 100-horsepower motor up and running so the Dipper can pull out of the station house in time to take its new generation of riders on a trip through history.

During the summer, the coaster will run from 11 a.m. until 11 p.m., at $2 a pop. For some, it will be more than an amusement park ride they’re paying for.

“People want to believe that they’re riding this thing that doesn’t look safe and that’s got this sordid history,� Cole said. “That way, they’ve accomplished something.�