Derby Equestrian Centre is part of Derby College based at the Broomfield Hall Campus. On site there is a purpose built 65mt x 30mt indoor riding school & teaching facility, classrooms, stables plus a 40mt x 40mt all weather outdoor floodlit riding arena.
The Installation Brief
With the 10th anniversary of the centre looming, manager Stephanie Meadows contacted Music Gear Installations to help her ‘save her voice and stop frightening the horses!’ For years, the training instruction literally has been delivered by shouting to the students within the vast arena space plus a small portable ‘ghetto blaster’ was used for playing music when required. After meeting on site and witnessing their challenge first hand, Music Gear Installations worked with the client to decide the best way forward. The top priority was to be able to clearly hear spoken instruction coming from their new installed sound system. Plus, the facility to have background music played through the new installed sound system at functions and presentations that were held regularly at the arena.
The Solution
The equestrian av installation had to be discreet, with the first and last installation speaker almost 60 metres apart. Also, a number of loudspeakers were required on the outside of the arena, to address the outdoor activities and school. The speakers were split into separate zones to allow for multiple use situations.
We decided to use numerous 5” 100volt line speaker enclosures around the indoor school and outdoor arena that have an IP rating for use outdoors. All speakers were powered using a multiple 4 zone mixer / amplifier that also had sufficient input sources for the microphones and the music source. When it came to the headset microphone, this needed to be capable of transmitting up to 70 metres diagonally when giving training instruction whilst riding a horse! The Shure BLX24 true diversity switchable twin system lived up to this task. Utilising the Shure PGA31A Headset microphone with BLX-1 Bodypack transmitter for horseback use, this was twinned with a BLX2 Handheld Transmitter with PG58 capsule. The handheld microphone was used for ‘ring side’ instructions and announcements during events and presentations.
”The Music Gear Installations Division installers went above and beyond their remit. Because of the nature of the installation, where drilling and any general noise had to be kept to a minimum due to the horses and the classes in progress, the team were very understanding and worked around our schedule” The PA system sounds great. All the students can hear me, I don’t frighten the horses with my shouting, I’ve got my voice back and I no longer sound so hoarse (ouch - sorry couldn’t resist the pun!)
Stephanie MeadowsEquestrian Centre Manager