Having worked together on projects such as the German House of Representatives in Berlin and the State Parliament in Düsseldorf, Acoustic Design Ahnert (ADA), Salzbrenner Stagetec Audio Video Mediensysteme, the systems integration section of the Salzbrenner Stagetec Mediagroup, have now updated the audio and sound reinforcement installation serving of Turkish Parliament (Grand National Assembly) in Ankara.
Supervised by Professor Ahnert, two teams equipped the parliament with a directional sound reinforcement system based on Stagetec’s Nexus Gain/Delay Matrix. While directional sound reinforcement is not new, only a few houses of parliament currently use such an advanced system.
In Ankara, the team installed a Salzbrenner Polaris Touch mixing console, an additional Nexus Base Station and a CAS 50600 media control system. One of the system functions is to monitor and report its status to the operator in the assembly control room.
The Grand National Assembly is divided into seven zones – three for the podium including the president, the speaker desk, the commission and the ministers; and four for the delegates. ‘This makes it easier for the delegates to follow debates because they are now able to determine the origin of a question from the floor area,’ says Jochen Schulz, the systems integrator’s technical coordinator for the Ankara project.
In total, the Nexus matrix handles 56 audio output channels that feed dedicated power amplifiers. Calibrating this number of channels and speakers is a specialist job and was performed by Ahnert, who is the first to admit that using measurement microphones only gets you so far – experience, expert ears, and the capability to compromise reasonably are no less important.
Based on the concept developed by Enno Finder (ADA) and Ahnert’s instructions, the Mediagroup team optimised the frequency response and programmed the Level/Delay matrix, setting the correct levels and delays for every single speaker, depending on its physical location, individually for each of the seven source zones. This way, the sound is loudest and first perceived from the approximate area of the microphone that a representative uses to ask a question or make a comment. Avoiding phase issues and intelligibility problems becomes a real challenge when using 56 speakers spread all over the hall. Nevertheless, it took Schulz only two days to get approval from both Ahnert and the parliament’s authorities.
A team from local integrator Atempo installed the Polaris Touch mixing console. Due to long distances within the parliament building, two Nexus Base Devices were used to provide all the functions requested by the client – one in the control room, the other under the roof next to the power amplifiers, connected via fibre-optic cabling to keep the cost down and to enable error detection in the control room. The Nexus system was connected to the d&b audiotechnik loudspeaker installation (see associated post link below) to provide connectivity and remote control functionality of the power amplifiers.
Status control and error monitoring of the power amplifiers and speakers is handled by a management routine running on the CAS 50600 Media Control system. This is also connected to programmable eight-key remote panels, which allow access to the sound system’s basic functions from outside the control room. The overall system provides three modes: Off (all power amplifiers on standby), Visitor (access to basic functions via remote panels) and Assembly (operated from the control room).
Once the system was up and running, Schulz and Dominik Stepanek of Salzbrenner Stagetec Audio Video Mediensysteme returned to provide hands-on training for the ten-strong technical crew. After explaining both the general system overview and each device in detail, another day was spent team working with Enno Finder from ADA to simulate a number of errors, providing invaluable troubleshooting tips for the parliament staff. Stepanek demonstrated all Polaris-related subjects during the comprehensive training sessions, and once again confirmed that ‘these sessions not only provide operators with the vital knowhow to use the system in the future – they also provide us with invaluable practical feedback on our products’.
See also:
d&b gives clear voice to Turkish Parliament
