It wasn’t too many years ago that most shows were supported with trapezoidal point-source loudspeakers that were either horn loaded or front loaded.

There were numerous touring companies providing proprietary loudspeaker systems, some well engineered and some not so well.

Rigging was often an afterthought, and many systems were ground stacked. Companies sprang up that did nothing but design and build aftermarket flying hardware to support both proprietary and manufacturer loudspeakers.

Depending on the combination of rigging and loudspeakers, the desired coverage might or might not be attained; we might or might not be able to get the exact coverage we were looking for, but because of the nature of point-source, a high level of precision was not required. Point and shoot was the order of the day.

Eventually most of the manufacturers caught on and started producing fairly capable touring systems with rigging hardware included.

Then came the line array craze. Line arrays only work properly with precise aiming and rigging. All of the components must be vertically stacked and spaced within about one-quarter of a wavelength at the frequency of interest to couple and produce the desired “cylindrical” wave front. The splay between cabinets in the vertical domain has a large effect on how the array behaves. Point and shoot will not work.

The potential to create unwanted lobes and nulls in the coverage pattern requires a fairly sophisticated modeling program to predict the array behavior accurately.

Some systems offer amplitude and frequency shading options. They also require rigging hardware that is precisely adjustable in single or even fractional degrees. Inclinometers and lasers have become part of the rigging toolkit.

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