Wyndham Cultural Centre upgrades with Tannoy

Published: October 01, 2013 ASIA

AUSTRALIA: The Wyndham Cultural Centre (WCC) in the outer south-western suburbs of Melbourne has upgraded its auditorium sound system with a solution based around Tannoy’s VX Series. The installation was handled by MultiTek Solutions.

‘The venue had some troubling times during the original construction. The theatrical infrastructure was lumped in with the general electrical scope of works with many things done in a non-industry standard way. This made the venue very hard to use when it first opened in 2001,’ noted Gavin Hulme, director of MultiTek Solutions. ‘However, the current technical managers and technicians have really done a great job in bring the venue up to a great standard by methodically fixing all the errors made during the construction.’

MultiTek Solutions has worked with the WCC from the initial post venue construction fix of the cabling infrastructure to ongoing preventative maintenance and equipment supply. As such it was in a strong position to consider the full needs of the venue.

‘As a regional arts centre they host the full gamut of shows, from the professional touring theatre company to the high school musical and Callisthenics production, along with the all important end of year dance school extravaganzas. So the system has to cater for all of them and their specific requirements,’ said Mr Hulme. ‘Whatever solution we put in place had to improve the overall coverage of the system throughout the venue, specifically the front few rows and the extreme rear. We also had to tidy up the sight lines and mount the subwoofers out of the way. As well as that, they wanted to increase the headroom of the system and provide some image steering for musicals.’

Mr Hulme cites his previous experience using Tannoy as a reason behind the selection. ‘I have used Tannoy for many years as a venue technician and love the coherency of a point source,’ reasoned the director. ‘In the end we went through the new ranges and chose the right models based on the overall dispersion pattern and power handling capability.’

Two Tannoy VX 12HPs have been mounted either side of the arch and another pair from the lighting bridge for delay. A single VX 12Q was mounted in the centre above the stage to help fill in the front row and also provide some image steering for musicals. Four VX 5.2s are employed across the front lip of the stage for those occasions when there is an orchestra in the pit, but these were attached using custom mounts to facilitate removal when not required. The VSX 18DR subwoofers are flown above the proscenium walls.

The amp racks were also rebuilt, using Powersoft amplification as well as using multiple BSS London units for DSP. ‘This provides the users with the flexibility of being able to address the system in different ways depending on the event. They are able to send just L and R to the system right up to being able to send multiple outputs from their console to each element of the system if required,’ explained Mr Hulme.

‘Now that the system is installed and the venue is up and running again, the overall response has been very positive – we have achieved the requirements set out at the beginning of the project,’ concluded Mr Hulme. ‘They now have a fantastic venue for the people of Werribee and beyond to enjoy for many years to come.’