The Beasley Performing Arts Coliseum at Washington State University in Pullman, the 12,000-capacity home to the women’s and men’s Cougar basketball teams and a variety of events, has been outfitted with a new sound reinforcement system designed by Anthony James Partners of Richmond, VA, that incorporates Danley Sound Labs Genesis Horn GH-60 loudspeakers.
The new sound system is part of a larger effort that also saw the school contract Daktronics of Brookings, SD, to install a new enter-hung scoreboard and video display,
“The original system consisted of a horn-loaded cluster hung in the middle of the facility,” explains David Sturzenbecher, audio project manager who spearheaded the installation for Daktronics. “It definitely lacked the presence and impact of a modern sound system. Moreover, its location was in direct conflict with the location of the new scoreboard and video display.
“While the budget was still tight, everyone agreed that the old sound system should be replaced in the process of installing the new scoreboard and video display.”
As in any bowl-shaped arena, the design challenge was to deliver consistent SPL to both the near seats and the far seats.
“The Danley Genesis Horn GH-60 uses a unique technology that they call ‘Shaded Amplitude Lens Technology, or S.A.L.T.’,” says Larry Lucas, director of audio engineering at Anthony James Partners. “With it, I was able to cover a wide section of seats with matching SPL.”
The Shaded Amplitude Lens Technology preserves the point-source performance for which Danley designs are known, while allowing for different output intensity at different heights. S.A.L.T. is an ingenious way of working with the inverse square law.
“Using the GH-60s and the other Danley boxes that were included led to a tremendous cost savings,” adds Sturzenbecher, “Each box requires only one amplifier channel, which was not only good for the budget, but also for the small equipment room we had to work with.”
Twelve Danley Genesis Horn GH-60s cover the lower bowl and much of the upper bowl in an exploded ring around center court. Eight Danley SM-60 full-range loudspeakers aimed downward from similar positions cover the floor.
Twenty Danley SH-100s fill in the highest reaches of the bowl in a delay ring, and four Danley TH-118 subwoofers provide low-end thump.
Fourteen Crown I-Tech 5000 amplifiers power the full-range boxes, and two Crown i-Tech 9000s power the subwoofers. Two BSS Soundweb London processors networked with a System Architech user interface provide system conditioning, logic, and control. The existing front end, which was both functional and modern, remained intact.
Depending on the requirements of the coliseum, school technicians can select predetermined zones and volumes with presets, such as “basketball game,” or they can manually adjust the volume of each individual zone. System Architect also provides valuable amplifier monitoring of voltage, temperature, etc.
“Tuning the system was relatively easy,” says Sturzenbecher, “The Danley units sounded great right out the box and they don’t require external crossovers and the like. I did little more than add some high pass filters for safety. Getting the delays right took some time, but now that they’re locked in and the upper bowl sounds great. The much larger challenges were working around the lighting fixtures and other existing hardware on the ceiling and ensuring that the flexibility of the space was maintained.”