Clair Solutions at Penn State’s Panzer Stadium
- Details
Pennsylvania-based AV design and integration firm Clair Solutions handled the broadcast infrastructure and sound reinforcement at Panzer Stadium, earning the job based in part on the proposal of Jim Devenney, Clair Solutions’ senior systems designer and in part on the successful completion of numerous other projects at Penn State.
“We originally got involved because we’ve done a lot of other work at Penn State, including 100,000-plus-seat Beaver Stadium,” Devenney explains. “The school benefited because we’re a one-stop-shop with deep in-house knowledge about the design and installation of audio and broadcast systems. In Clair’s long history, we’ve seen it all.”
Clair Solutions’ design/build worked in synergy with the larger project, which was designed by Moody Nolan, of Columbus, Ohio and APArchitects of Lemont, Pennsylvania, and built by general contractor PJ Dick of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Devenney’s design gives Panzer Stadium comprehensive connectivity via a lot of single-mode fibre, Cat 6 data, video, and audio. “The cabling itself wasn’t cheap,” Devenney observes. “When you’re buying a lot of wire, well, it is what it is.” Wires run from all possible camera positions and then sensibly split or go to the press box and/or the broadcast truck pedestal.”
The sound reinforcement system is modest but capable of future growth if needed. A Soundcraft Si Expression 1 console serves as the user interface for Penn State’s audio techs and brings together a bevy of Shure wired and wireless microphones and various playback devices. A BSS Blu160 DSP system handles input conditioning, routing logic, and loudspeaker conditioning and also provides simple, on-field input and volume control.
Lab.gruppen C-series multi-channel amplifiers power Community R2-series outdoor loudspeakers and JBL Control-series indoor loudspeakers.
(Jim Evans)
