Iconyx cuts through the jungle of Jewel
With designer retail outlets, renowned duty-free shops and relaxation areas, Changi Airport has long developed a knack in entertaining its transit passengers. The 10-storey toroidal, glass and steel, nature-themed entertainment and retail complex christened Jewel may be an architectural masterpiece, but it is also an acoustician’s nightmare. Hence the requirement to draft in the expertise of Electro-Acoustics Systems Pte Ltd (EAS) and a Renkus-Heinz IC beam-steering column speaker system.
The four-year gestation to transform an open-air car park into a S$1.7 billion investment speculates Singapore’s continued success as an aviation and tourism hub. Designed by a consortium of architects, led by Moshe Safdie who designed Singapore’s Marina Bay Sands, the existing airport car park at the front of Terminal One has been utterly transformed. Three years in the making perhaps, but once the wraps had been removed, it laid down the gauntlet to other airport hubs. Boasting multiple attractions, a hotel and over 300 retail and dining options, the central focus of the 135,700m2 space is the 40m indoor waterfall named the HSBC Rain Vortex.
The combination of the waterfall and five-storey garden with 2,500 trees and 100,000 shrubs creates a jungle effect. At the upper level of Jewel, the Canopy Park includes the Topiary Walk and Petal Garden, featuring animal-shaped topiaries and seasonal floral displays, respectively. A dig into the undergrowth confirms the existence of Renkus-Heinz loudspeakers, constituting a large part of the Jewel Performance Audio System.
‘The Performance Audio System is responsible for playing background music, needed to be seamlessly integrated with the existing Changi Airport public address system and provide sound reinforcement for the nightly light-and-sound fountain show,’ confirmed Renkus-Heinz APAC application engineer, KK Tan. ‘Stanley Security Singapore Pte Ltd called upon EAS to design, program and configure the Performance Audio System so that it would interface with the public address, EVAC and fountain loudspeaker systems.’
Owing to the acoustic complexity and vast size of Jewel, Iconyx steerable loudspeaker models were selected on account of their reliability and reputation in the market. In total, 12 IC24, two IC16 and 10 IC8 Iconyx Gen5 models are networked via a Cat-6a cabling infrastructure throughout the upper levels. Stanley Security Singapore has disguised the column speakers among the vegetation thanks to the finish of the column speakers that match the poles they are fixed to.
‘Following accurate RHAON II System Designer software programming, we managed to avoid acoustic reflections from the sloping glass panels, which in turn has minimised reverberation and audio slap-back,’ furthered Tan. ‘My time onsite for commissioning was restricted to just two days. My works were slightly compromised as retailers were testing their individual systems during the day and I had to stop at 7pm as another contractor was testing the fountain system in the evening.’
EAS also supplied and programmed 11 Biamp Vocia VA8600 multichannel amplifiers that power the Bosch PA EVAC and BGM throughout the attraction. Seven of the networked amplifiers integrate V0-4e four line-level output channel expansion cards that effectively store EVAC messages. Incorporating 48 channels of I/O, a Tesira I/O server further equipped with a DSP-2 card provides a Dante network connection with the fountain loudspeaker system. Both the Renkus-Heinz Iconyx and Vocia systems are remotely managed from a PC in the Fire Command Centre.
‘The speaker locations were restricted but configuring the DSP settings within the Iconyx Gen5 software ensured the resultant beams are evenly dispersed on the upper levels,’ added Tan.
Beams that cut through jungle effects, mitigating the roar of the biggest man-made waterfall in the world, while avoiding glass reflections – just another day at the office for Renkus-Heinz and EAS.
Source: https://www.proavl-asia.com/details/63169-exclusive-iconyx-cuts-through-the-jungle-of-jewel