Paul Brown Stadium installs 580 RCF custom speakers

The headquarters of the Cincinnati Bengals of the North American city has renewed its sound equipment thanks to the partnership between Durrel Sports and the audio manufacturer.

In the last twenty years, The Cincinnati Bengals are one of the great nfl teams that has hosted at its headquarters, the Paul Brown Stadium (known as PBS), to their rivals. A sports complex with capacity for 65.515 seats, historically known for the power and quality of its audio system in this city in the United States.

In addition to sport, this stadium is famous for holding musical events, with the performance of artists such as Kenny Chesney or Guns N’ Roses, among other great figures, that materialized the commitment of those responsible for quality sound, from the lobbies to the stands.

To maintain this goal, the stadium decided to revamp the original audio with a new system that opened late last year with a limited number of fans., because of the pandemic, who was able to attend a game between the Bengals and the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Designed and implemented by Durrell Sports Audio Management, based in Nashville (Tennessee – USA. USA), the new system retains some components of the original, that remain reliable and functional. Updated digital processing and installed custom speakers Rcf to respond to the needs of this application.

"Paul Brown Stadium is unlike any other stadium in the United States when it comes to audio," said John Horrell., by Durrell Sports-. All aspects of production on the meeting day, from simple ads, to music, is as live is possible. There is nothing like it, even vaguely, to a pre-recorded TV show. When we were chosen to update the audio, we saw that it was essential to create a system truly capable of delivering the high level and performance of a concert.".

The system upgrade and upgrade project was deployed in three stages. The first began a few years ago with the installation of new RCF speakers for the ceilings and upper stands. The second phase added approximately 120 manufacturer's speakers for the lower stands and others 70 for the ceilings of the pavilion, alongside 8 double subwoofer 21" on each side of the pavilion roof.

The third phase of the project was approved in January of the 2020, and by February the work was already underway to turn this vision into a reality. Despite the advance of the global pandemic in March, the design and installation team met the construction deadlines with the help of suppliers, including RCF.

The Italian manufacturer's speakers played a decisive role in phase three, that supplied custom units, designed to Durrel's specifications for the stadium. HVL 15-L1 and HVL 15-P1 long-range passive speakers were installed, as well as other RCF catalog standards, including P models 4228, P 3115T and P 6215, installed as downfills.

RCF HVL 15-L1 speakers are characterized by a symmetrical arrangement, with a pair of 15" woofers for the low range, another 10" mid-range torque and two compression motors, with 4" voice coils and titanium dome for high frequencies.

All transducers are equipped with neodymium magnets. With a frequency response of 43Hz – 18,000hz (-10Db), these long-range three-way boxes work with two amplifiers and are capable of producing a maximum SPL of 133dB (Lf) and 145dB (MHF). The horizontal coverage is 90 and the vertical of 30°.

The eight HVL 15-P1, built specifically by RCF for installation on the PBS, share many design features of the 15-L1 models: same frequency range and symmetrical bi-amplified passive crossover and same external construction. Equipped with the same state-of-the-art RCF transducers, have a narrower coverage angle (60°x30°).

Durrell's team spent a lot of time analyzing Q values. (the directivity factor of the speaker) required by the system and proposed to RCF a customized solution that had not been realized for such an extreme installation.

"Understand the Q values of speakers in a stadium environment, it is essential to manage rebounds, stresses Horrell.. In its simplest terms, Q is the value of 'projection'’ of the speaker at a long distance. Designing the right Q values of the speakers was our biggest challenge.. C on proper processing and RCF speakers, optimized to our specifications, we create a distributed system in which the viewer, no matter where you are sitting ,will never be affected by a speaker intended to cover another area.".

As those responsible for the stadium point out, "RCF speakers differ greatly from their predecessors in terms of balance and overall coverage.. The coverage at the facility is excellent and a completely new experience for our fans.. Paul Brown Stadium can remain one of the best sound venues in the world.".

In this line, John Horrell adds that "the new system has such a high dynamic that we can define it as one of the best systems in the NFL.. We could never have done this with line arrays and this system will last another twenty years or more.".

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