A Usd 550m project, the Dubai Water Canal comprises one shopping centre, four hotels, 450 restaurants, luxury housing, walkways and cycle paths. The Canal is 2.9 Km long, starting from Business Bay down to the Gulf through Safa Park and Jumeirah. The width ranges from 80mto 120m. The navigable canal is crossed by 12m high bridges.
One of the main visual attractions of the complex is the giant 160 m water feature of the Sheikh Zayed Dubai, a technical marvel that at night turns the bridge into a waterfall shining with the eye-catching magic of dynamic colour lighting.
For a project of this scale and complexity, the choice of the technical partner could only fall on Magical Water Fountains company, specializing in top level water feature projects realized all over the world, from Europe to the Middle East, from America to the Far East.
Magical Water Fountains chose Helios Bronze FC underwater LED projectors by DTS for this one-of-a-kind lighting project. Two hundred and forty Helios Bronze FC units were installed.
The Helios features perfectly fit this demanding task: full IP68 protection rate; body made of bronze, to withstand the salt water environment; high quality RGBW colour mixing with an endless palette of colours and extreme brightness.
Philippe Aerts, CEO of Magical Water Fountains, said, "The Road & Transport Authority (RTA) of Dubai appointed Magical Water for this project; we started the construction of this project only three months ago; the goal was to create a water feature that put the Sheikh Zayed bridge in a scale never imagined before.
"We decided to go for the Helios Bronze FC when we started the final development with DTS engineer, Andrea Gabrielli.
"Michel Amann of Crystal Group was the key person in the company for testing in real conditions, and being close with DTS R&D department is very important for us as we always want to increase to quality products.
"Now the Helios is using a new generation Osram LED which is extremely bright and is one of the most powerful right now. Our company always looks for the high quality full colour output."
Philippe Aerts added, "The client request was to display a unique waterfall system not existing anywhere else in the world. As the waterfall was engineered with the possibility to control individually each one of the 80 water pumps we installed, we can open and close the water feature as a curtain for the entry and exit of boats.
"Each Helios BRONZE FC offers a great choice ofcolours and will be used to display customised patterns during special events."
(Jim Evans)
