Havigng installed a Martin Audio Wavefront W0.5 miniature sound system in the Heritage Baptist Church in Zebulon, North Carolina, in 2000 – a move that has since given the church an excellent return on its investment – RMB Audio recently returned to refresh the installation and realised that components of this vintage were no longer available. An alternative solution was now required...
The original splayed loudspeaker array was designed to provide coverage for a congregation of 600, complete with balcony beneath a vaulted pentagonal roof. Seating on the sanctuary floor presented a 200° fan to the pulpit, which required some angle separation between the cabinet hangs to provide an overlap from the 100° horizontal pattern.
To bring the system up to date RMB owner Cooper Cannady turned to Martin Audio’s O-Line micro-line array for its accuracy and consistency, with two eight-element hangs proposed after modelling in Martin Audio’s Display software. Suspended from the existing half-circle frame, the new rig provides coverage for the floor and balcony seating to the point where the existing under-balcony C115 loudspeakers were no longer required to reach the last four rows of rear seating.
Cannady had confidence that O-Line would be the best solution: ‘We knew it would be spectacular for that venue,’ he says. ‘I sent them some photos of other installations we had done, and after discussing how much throw they would need they were left in no doubt as to what they were going to get. We have been able to run the system off their existing amplifiers and it went together really well, with all the angles fitting in very nicely.’
Each box could be run off a single amplifier channel without applying any resolution, although RMB will add Martin Audio’s dedicated DX4.0 system controller in due course – with FIR filter settings loaded in – largely for limiting and minor frequency adjustment. ‘The quality has increased tremendously,’ Cannady reports. ‘Aside from its throw, we’re experiencing no wall reflections, lobing or low-end thrust to the stage; it’s evened out very nicely.’
This is particularly important, he says, as three generations of families routinely attend services. ‘The older generation have said they can hear much better – which is always our top goal – O-Line brings the spoken word up significantly.’
In addition to the intelligibility and clarity brought to the celebrants’ speech, the church features worship bands, comprising piano, organ, a brass section and acoustic guitars. ‘When we initially demoed the system, we played music that had some pretty robust low end to it.’
Designed to ne architecturally discreet, the PA’s transformation from black to white the change has hardly been noticed, according to Cannady. ‘In fact it looks very attractive up there.’