BL Acoustics were engaged to design and install a simple but flexible PA system at All Saint’s Church in Stock, Essex.
The Church criteria was to bring enhancement to their services and audio clarity for the choir and congregation, plus a means of adding additional input to the service. Being a small church, this needed to be discreet but effective and not overpowering.
Control of the system was also an important requirement for the organist.
The highly reverberant space was making it difficult for services to be heard clearly and this caused operational problems for the teams.
Proposal
Proposed was a small system consisting of four radio microphones, one lectern microphone and multi-media inputs. For control we provided the organist with independent volume control over the Chancel and Nave loudspeakers, a dedicated Audio Input and local Remote-Control Sensor for the Media Player all situated next to the Organist at high level.
Installation
The installation used colour co-ordinated cable, loudspeakers and antenna so as not to be intrusive when seen from floor level.
The system provided 14 independent inputs allowing the capacity to add more inputs and loudspeakers if required. The 240-Watt BOSCH Plena Amplification and TOA TZ206 20-Watt column loudspeakers provided clear sound with minimal feedback.
The DN-500CB Multi-Media Player and DN312X Input Mixer were both made by Denon.
Microphones used were Sennheiser XSW2-C11. These are not the usual vocal radio systems. The XSW2 system was developed for combined use with theatre, music and speech and so has the added flexibility of being used as mobile audio line inputs too for bands or presentation laptops etc. should the church expand.
Completion
On completion, testing, and first use, the Church and users were very happy with the system achieving exactly what was needed and more. Read our testimonial from All Saints Church below.
For more information on Public Address Systems, please click here: Public Address Systems | B L Acoustics Limited
On behalf of the All Saints’ Congregation at Stock Harvard, Essex, we wanted to thank you and your team for the outstanding Sound System which you installed in June 2021.
Your expertise and professionalism were really appreciated, and you have guided us through a difficult and challenging project with sensitivity to the needs of our worship.
On the first Sunday of use, we had many comments from the congregation who said that they were overwhelmed by the systems natural amplification of the clergy and readers’ voices.
You took care to explain how the system worked and all the controls were easy to understand and use.
We would have no hesitation in recommending you to any other parties interested in such an installation.
All Saints’ Church PCC
B L Acoustics are proud to add another notch to our belt, having successfully completed the replacement of the public address and voice alarm systems at the (formerly named) Arena Birmingham. The old systems were replaced with Bosch Praesideo EN54 compliant systems communicating via a site-wide optical network installed and designed by BLA.
Utilita Arena Birmingham is an indoor arena and sporting venue with a capacity for 15,800 people. Each year (excluding lockdown), the venue hosts over 100 live events and welcomes half a million visitors through its doors. In 2018 the venue underwent a major renovation with remodelling of the concourse areas and public realm.
A site maintenance visit highlighted several issues with the site’s PAVA system. The main issue was the lack of audibility in certain areas during an evacuation, particularly the main concourse area. The audibility problems were caused by a combination of high noise levels from the smoke extract fans and unsuitability of the loudspeakers installed as part of the renovation project
B L Acoustics have been maintaining the systems at the ever-developing site for many years which helped us to acquire substantial site-specific information which proved to be valuable throughout the complex installation. This benefit enabled us to recognise that maintenance visits before 2019 continued to report existing and new issues across the system with some components beyond their recommended life.
Our Proposal
A solution was designed for the problem areas and modelled using acoustic modelling software. More suitable loudspeakers and an improved layout was proposed and installed to produce much improved audibility even when the smoke extract was running. The increased power requirements of the new loudspeaker layout design had an effect on the rest of the system as higher power loudspeakers require more amplification, and more amplification requires higher capacity battery support.
Our proposal offered replacement equipment which would have the capacity to support the improved loudspeaker coverage throughout the building. This would include the installation of a new high integrity fibre cable network between each of the equipment locations. As well as changing the loudspeaker layout in the concourse areas, each voice alarm loudspeaker across the site was upgraded to new EN54 variants.
During the operation of the aforementioned fans, the SPL level would need to be a substantial level, which would be too high for normal PA announcements. The system includes for ambient noise sensing in the concourse areas to allow the full potential of the system to be used when the fans are operational but keeps PA announcements at a comfortable level during normal operation.
One of the major priorities our client expressed was that the systems could remain in full use throughout the replacement process. The venue is an extremely busy one, meaning that downtime of the system would have been unacceptable and hazardous to life safety.
System Replacement
The completed project was a result of thirty days/nights of work, involving multiple phases of installation, commencing with the fitting of a new resilient loop in fire-rated cable across the site. To ensure the site remained operational throughout the installation process, temporary audio and control links were fitted between the new and existing systems so that both systems could operate concurrently while circuits were switched over from the old system to the new.
Microphone Panels
The old system had both emergency fireman’s microphone and paging microphone units located in various positions throughout the site. B L Acoustics provided replacement units and in the case of the fireman’s microphone provided re-engineered panels which were custom-built to fit their location.
Loudspeakers
Choosing loudspeaker types was critical to the project with tight specifications to provide key criteria:
– EN54 Compliance
– Acoustic Performance
– Aesthetics
– Programme Windows
All loudspeakers were replaced to meet the latest EN54 standards; compact Bosch ceiling loudspeakers were utilised in most areas.
