Sound system manufacturer Equaphon has claimed a first for Argentina after completing an installation project at Estadio Único Madre de Ciudades, a new 28,000-seat stadium in the city of Santiago del Estero.
According to Equaphon, the venue becomes the first in Argentina to include the design and installation of sound systems from the building stage. The sound system installation was completed last month and includes more than 10 zones, offering the possibility of directing different audio programmes to each zone, furnishing to the needs of each event and circumstance.
Plans for the Estadio Único were first unveiled in April 2018, with work commencing two months later. The stadium was officially completed in May.
The stadium design complies with FIFA, CONMEBOL and Argentine Football Association (AFA) standards and will be a host venue at next year’s Copa América, which Argentina will co-host with Colombia.
The stadium centres on a cylindrical design with covered grandstands and has been hailed as one of the most modern venues in Argentina. The stadium was designed with a main access plaza, a sports museum, VIP sectors, restaurant spaces and a 400-capacity car park.
Equaphon, an Argentine company and manufacturer of the STS Touring Series Systems, was appointed to design and install audio technology at the venue and the firm has now provided details of what the system entails.
The stadium sound system features announcement, emergency and paging functions and can be controlled through touch panels from three different locations within the stadium. Beyerdynamic gooseneck and stand microphones were chosen to provide enhanced speech quality.
The system uses a total of 19 Powersoft Quattrocanali 4804 DSP + D amplifiers, two Powersoft Mezzo 322 AD and two Powersoft Mezzo 604 A. As the main matrix, a Xilica Solaro FR1 Dante is used and, in the locations where an analogue audio signal needs to be input, two Xilica Solaro XIO-8 are used. All this equipment communicates under Dante protocol and takes advantage of the stadium’s optical fibre ring.
The main exterior systems covering all the grandstands were designed based on acoustic optimisations and simulations using EASE Focus software, and consist of eight arrays of 12 STS Linea V15i cabinets mounted on a custom-designed steel frame to provide the exact angulation between boxes, as well as their total absolute angulation. These arrangements have been raised and permanently suspended on the outer ring of the roof structure, 30 metres high.
Checked once installation was over, the difference between prediction and implementation turned out in the order of one degree. The V15i box is a bi-amplifiable design and the chosen amplifier is the Quattrocanali 4804 DSP + D. Each amplifier can power six V15i cabinets and, as it has a Dante input, allows two amplifiers to be placed in a rack close to the arrangement, shortening the length of speaker wiring while allowing maintenance and inspection without the need to lift the system. The remaining areas were covered, according to their needs, by two-way cabinets or coaxial ceiling speakers on 100V lines, totalling approximately 500 units.
