Church Profile
Sound & Acoustics

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Acoustical Profile

• New Church Built in 1994

• Seating capacity - 800

• Shape of Church - 6 sided Hexagon - 4 side are 45 feet - 2 side are 68 feet.

• Each wall is off set by 5 degrees

• Main Physical Feature - Drywall out-rounds above the lights on the walls.

• Each out-round is different in size. The different widths are from 9 feet to 14 feet

• Ceiling and walls - 5/8th drywall

• Out-rounds are 1/2 inch drywall

• Cost of adding the out-rounds - less than $5,000.00

• Floor - 100% carpeted

• Pews - Padded seats

• Wall height - 22 feet

• Average RT60 - 1.6 seconds

• RT60 at 200 hertz 1.9 seconds

• RT60 at 2000 hertz 1.4 seconds

• Comments - Minister often speaks from the pulpit without the sound system on. - The local community considers the church as the best public building for cultural events.

• Choir Loft seats 30

  
  

Sound System Profile

SPEAKER SYSTEM

• System Type - Central Cluster arrangement

• Stage is wired for 4 monitor mixes

• Intelligibility score of the room is 8% in 90% of the seating are. Lowest score was 9.6%

• Intelligibility score with speaker system 6.8%

• Speaker Type - Point Source - Dual Concentric Speakers

• Name Brand - Tannoy CPA 15 (15" woofer and 1.5" HF) - Stock Box painted

• Power handling per box - peaks 400 watts

• Number of units- 3

• Speaker system was tested in 11 different positions along the support bar.

• Walk around shows even coverage - Actual coverage SPL was not done

• System has been working 2 years. Most visiting Christian performers prefer the house system. There have been no hearing complaint from people with normal hearing.

• Speaker Bracket System - Main Support beam is 4-1/2" heavy Box Tube - 21 feet long. The bar was tested for 1000 pound static weight and 10 foot drop of 500 pounds.

• Vertical bars are 1 1/2" box tubes

• All brackets can pan and tilt.

• Brackets are design to support future expansion of Sub Woofer and video projector

MIXER DESK

• Built by a local church member from another denomination

• The desk is large enough to install a typical 32 channel mixer or 48 channel compact mixer.

• The desk current has the following items

  • 1 24 channel mixer - Soundcraft Spirit Live 4

  • 1 Auto Reverse Cassette Recorder

  • 1 Cassette Player with Pitch Control - Tascam R112

  • 1 CD player

  • 2 Wireless Lapel Mics - Telex FR100

  • 1 Dual channel octave EQ for wireless lapel mics

  • 1 Six channel lighting mixer for sanctuary lighting

  • 1 Twelve channel Lighting mixer for stage lighting

  • When these pictures were taken, the legs of the mixer desk were 36 inches. Since then the legs have been cut twice to the original 24 inches as planned for the HIS System.

  

• The back of the mixer desk is only 5 inches higher than the back of the pews (not shown)

• When the desk is close, it is very effective at keeping unauthorized hands away from the controls

• A head set is a full ear unit to keep the room noise out when problem solving.

• (as a rule, never mix with a headset. It will through you off.)

• When making a desk, make sure that the there is at least 4 or 5 coats of sealant. A desk this size will crack if not dried out slowly.

• There are 32 mic lines from the stage and 14 lines back to the power room. From the power room there are 10 return lines to the stage and mixer.
  

• LIGHTING

• Ceiling height at the peak - 32 feet

• Lighting - 50 - 500 watt quartz lamps reflecting off the roof.

• 160 foot candles on the floor - up to 300 foot candles with stage lights on on the platform area.

• All lights can be reached on a 10 foot ladder

• All lights are full dimmable

• The system was a low cost analog system that is well EMI radiation protected.

• There are 30 par 56 and 64 cans and a few other specialty lights.

EQ

• This is a shot of the actual House EQ setting

• House EQ is an Ashly 1/3 Octave EQ

• Balanced inputs and outputs

• Setting method - Feedback

• Note - A MLSSA System was initially used to set the house EQ but the client preferred the FEEDBACK method settings

• Please also note the there are only cuts, no boosts

• Boosting can introduce phase shift, and this is most noticeable in sound reinforcement.

• Other EQ's that could have been used are RANE GE30, White's, Micro Audio....

• There are 3 other EQ's for the monitor mixes that were reused from the old church sound system. These are scheduled to be replaced soon

AMPS

• Total available power to the cluster - 1200 watts plus 4dB of headroom for a total of burst power up to 2400 watts

• Amps are Ashly FET 2000

• Other amplifiers that could have been used are Haffler, Crest, Crown....

• 1 amp is mono bridged to the center speaker. Later the "B" channel will be used for a sub woofer system

• The second amp is feeding each speaker direct. - 1 channel - 1 speaker.

• There are 2 other amplifiers used for the 3 monitor mixes

• There are a variety of monitor speakers brought over from the old church.

Project Credits

Copyright © 1996 Joe De Buglio
For Direct Assistance you can Contact Joseph De Buglio Direct