Malta Camp
Summer of 2018 Direct Acoustics worked with the Order or Malta charity to deliver a week of partying for 500 young people with disabilities
Introduction
The Order of Malta worked hard to organised week of activities and adventures had been organised for the 500 young people and their carers with each day finishing up with a night of partying. To accommodate the number of guests the organisers chose to erect a marquee in a schools field giving them the flexibility of size and logistics of transporting that many people. However, less than 200m’s from the marquee across open fields were a number of residential properties. The organisers approached us to provide insight into the likely impact of music late into the night, our engineers spent an evening collecting ambient data and modeled a typical PA setup with this information. The results weren’t encouraging, any standard sound system would result in significant disturbances to the residents and have a high possibility of leading to a noise complaint that could shut down the much anticipated party.
Challenge
Five nights of loud music and guests in a standard 5m clear span marquee with houses only 200m’s away that needed to be able to go on late into the night.
Solution
A 144 panel highly directional Zone Array with precise control over volume combined with the noise mitigating capabilities of our heaviest lining installed throughout the marquee. With acoustic engineers attending each event.
Results
We created an acoustically sealed marquee that allowed the dancefloor to sit at an impressive 99dB with the boundary at only 40dB. The guests danced the night away while the neighbours slept peacefully.
Plan
With careful consideration of the clients requirements for required volume level and late finishing time we developed a solution that combined Direct Acoustics strongest tools and experience.
We proposed the use of our heaviest weight acoustic lining that can absorb up to 16dB of sound be installed throughout the marquee. This would create a acoustically treated environment that would cut out the unamplified noise and aid significantly with amplified music.
Developed to fit within the Kader track of a clear span marquee the acoustic lining was the perfect soundproofing solution for this event. We were able to install during the erection of the marquee keeping to a tight timeline required by the client.
However, alone the acoustic lining wasn’t going to be enough to mitigate against amplified music. Our highly directional Zone Array with it’s ability to isolate the bass frequencies to just the dancefloor and exceptional volume drop off over distance compared to a standard PA was required.
We installed 144 Zone Array Panels in a dispersed configuration to give the greatest distribution of sound across the large dancefloor whilst maintaining the directionality engineered into the system. To achieve the greatest results we provided an acoustic and sound engineer on site for all five events to closely monitor the levels on the dancefloor and boundary.
Results
The combination of the three tools used, the Acoustic Lining, Zone Array and our onsite presence resulted in five nights of fun for the guests and five nights of peaceful rest for the neighbours. We were able to maintain a more than respectable 99dB on the dancefloor while not exceeding 40dB at the boundary, well within the acceptable limits.
No noise complaints were lodged and the client was exceptionally happy with the results of the system and event!