Stuart91

This will be far easier to track down these days too, when every dance school mum is live-streaming onto Facebook whilst the show is underway.

All good points, thanks everyone. I've explained some of the challenges to the client who is OK with me quoting a day rate and saying "it'll take as long as it takes" rather than a solid figure. We'll probably go armed with a variety of options to encourage the nuts to loosen. The plan is that the ceiling will be made good after we've done our bit - the objective is to hide any evidence of their having been fixings there. This would work OK - in fact I won't even need to cut the studs down, as long as I can get the nuts off and the saddle brackets removed. The studs stop well short of the ceiling so the patches will conceal them quite nicely.

That might work. They are standard saddle brackets so we have two fixings per bracket, but could probably pull down at an angle to apply some force behind the nut.

I like this idea - could be a plan. The complicating factor with any cut-off tools is that the fixings are recessed from the ceiling surface - we've got lathe-and-plaster over the concrete slab. This has been cut away to give space for the brackets, but only just. There's no room round about to get a blade in without savaging the surrounding material.

I've had an interesting job land in my lap. A venue we deal with has a bunch of ceiling brackets that need removed. They're into a fairly inconsistent concrete slab above, and the fixings are through-bolt style rawlbolts, like this: The problem is that the concrete is loose enough that the fixing spins freely, but the nut won't loosen at all. I had a shot at one and the only way I could ease it off was by holding the protruding thread with a pair of pliers and using a spanner. That's fiddly and time-consuming, but there's not enough clear space around the bolt heads to do much else. I can't get an angle grinder into it, for instance. There's a couple of dozen of these fixings need to come out, and I'm dreading the task. I'm wondering if there's some sort of specialised tool that would help with this? I'm guessing it can't be that uncommon a problem but I can't even think of what terms to start googling.

Community have their R-series and WET models which are potentially worth a look. When you say "weatherproof", are you going to be putting the speakers out for a gig, then bringing them back in again the same day, or leaving them out indefinitely? There are plenty boxes that will cope with a bit of rain if dried off reasonably promptly, but won't last permanent exposure to the elements.

If it's literally just for pre-programming (i.e. you're not opping the show with the Mobile during the trip) would it be easier to buy an Editor key and just use the laptop by itself? Not as nice as having all the physical handles but would save a lot of hassle.

There was some chat about this on the Avolites Facebook group the other day, might be worth having a look over there. From what I remember most posters hadn't encountered any problems. Someone on the Avo chat had ended up explaining to the Customs officer that their Mobile was a "DJ controller" as it seemed to be the closest description that they understood.

There are some cameras out there that will automatically follow the ball, so they pan around the pitch as the action moves from end to end. (One famously mistook a bald-headed linesman for the ball) I doubt these will be particularly cheap - they seem fairly specialist and were aimed at clubs who needed to livestream matches during covid but couldn't afford a full camera crew. CCTV technology has come on a lot in recent years but I don't think there's anything out there that will do what the OP wants. A single camera will either not capture the whole pitch, or be zoomed out so far that you can't make anything out. Multiple cameras would need manually cut, which isn't going to be within the budget for amateur 5-a-side matches.

It would be an ugly bodge, but four HDMI to HD-TVI adaptors and a four channel CCTV DVR would do the trick. The only advantage here is cheapness, plus the fact that you can hopefully hide all the gubbins in the back of a rack.

We've used this combination regularly for many years without problems. That's interesting, because they're supposed to be an omnidirectional element. We have had similar problems when customers have mounted directional paddles pointing off-stage... but omnis have been fine.

I suspect the problem with used mirrorballs is that most are mashed, given how fragile they are. If the cost of carriage keeps up, there will come a point where UK-based manufacture becomes feasible again. Who wants a full-time job sticking facets onto mirrorballs?

More out of curiosity than anything - is there a correct answer to this? I'd guess that the triac/switching circuitry draws more power, but for shorter duration? Thankfully my days of playing Buckaroo with generics are largely over, instead it's managing the leakage from LED fixtures that is the challenge...

I'm pretty certain that the original Shure ones are interchangeable. (A church I know had one singer that objected to being the only one with a non-Beta SM58. The solution was to put a Beta grille on it. 😃)

A company I used to know turned up at a venue only to find that their ramp had been stolen from under the truck, presumably when it was parked overnight at motorway services. This did not make for a fun load-in...

I've only been in BBC facilities a handful of times, but there seemed to be quite stringent security in place. I'm guessing the culprit in this incident managed to find a way around it. The high profile of TV studios makes them a natural target for protestors and pranksters. It's happened before. (Oh, and then there's these muppets. )

I think as Dave suggested above, a small platform lift would have been the answer here. That probably got knocked back on cost grounds as the question of disabled access was only raised quite late in the build process. Part of the problem with the wooden ramp that they got was the bulk as well as the size. It had a sturdy framework of 4x2" timber and was sheeted with 18mm ply, on the sides as well as the running surface. Even split into two sections, this made it difficult to lift and manoeuvre. I suspect an aluminium ramp would have ended up being better. The length problem wouldn't have gone away but it could at least have been stowed against a wall when not in use. Overall weight would have been around the same, at worst, but end then could have been a relatively easy 2-person lift.

Could have just as easily have been a bomb...

That's very useful. The first thing we did was run a test pattern from the controller, which may not have been ideal. I'll need to check the manual, but suspect it bypasses the brightness controls and runs the patterns at 100%. (Certainly seemed that way) It reminds me of ye olden days when it was important to preheat your filaments rather than slamming a lighting rig on to full brightness.

Not sure about the humidity (although I've got a meter on order from Amazon at the moment). It's essentially an unheated warehouse - pretty poorly insulated. This time of year you can see your breath in front of your face. However there was no sign of any moisture on the panels, and the room in general seems dry.

One of our clients bought an LED wall last summer. They only operate it seasonally, so it has been sitting unused since early autumn. Last week we powered it up for the first time in a few months. There is now a noticeable amount of dead pixels, a quick count suggests that roughly 1/4 of the panels will need swapped out. A complaint has been raised with the manufacturer. Their response is that the panels shouldn't be left unused, and the inrush of current after the downtime is what could have caused the damage. They recommend running the screen for a minimum of eight hours a week. The client is getting hammered by energy bills so won't be happy running with that prospect (although it's cheaper than replacing panels every season). What's probably going to be more irritating is having to roster a staff member to go in and deal with it when the venue isn't in use. What I'm wondering is if this is a common requirement? I've not come across it before, although we have only really dabbled with LED up until now. Whilst rental companies aim to keep their stock busy working, there must inevitably be gaps in the diary - and what did people do during covid?

Apart from anything else this arrangement will make it much more straightforward to narrow down faults.

A venue we worked with was being refurbished. Someone quite rightly brought up the issue of wheelchair access to their platform, and it was decided that a ramp would be built. The architect instructed the joiners to build something to the regs, I suspect around 1 in 12. What they ended up with stretched almost halfway into the audience area, and each section required four people to lift it. The platform was only 18 inches or so high. Somewhat predictably, the ramp was put into storage where it has remained ever since.

Which model of Jester are you using? Is it an ML (which has the wheels for moving light control)? Also when you say "fixture", what are actual lights? I'd usually think that fixture would imply an intelligent light of some kind (as opposed to a simpler generic lantern running from a dimmer channel). But terminology varies...

I bought some suspiciously cheap LED Pars a few years ago. They had cast metal casings, which looked as if they had rusted and been hastily painted over. Did make me wonder if the casings had just been sitting in a pile in a field before some enterprising person married them up with some cheap innards. To be fair, the casing looked fine from a few feet away and the handful we put into a very low-budget install have given stalwart service with no failures or niggles. The fans are a bit on the noisy side but that comes with the territory at this kind of price point.