I am putting in a bid on redoing a roller skating rink. I am after suggestions on good inexpensive products to use. I am very familliar with Mackie, Peavey, Qsc, Crown and a few others. Existing equipment will go. It is a hodge podgeof crap. Anyway. Any help is apprecieated. Thanks

What sort of commercial systems have you done in the past? The bulletproof nature of a lot of those components, in comparison to home components, places them in a different world. Also, they almost all use three-prong plugs, which means that grounding issues can be totally different and weird in a commercial situation. Add to that the fact that most of us who have done home systems have no clue about microphones and feedback, and I hope you have an idea what you are getting into.

I have been involved in audio and video since the early seventies, and because my focus is residential, I would call on a friend for this information, and maybe to source and supply and yes, make the profit himself on the components, in order to be sure the right stuff was used. Here's how serious I am about this: he started out as a car stereo installer and I taught him residential. I taught him a lot of what he knows theoretically, and even helped him with a troubleshooting problem last week. But he branched out into commercial and now does almost exclusively commercial work, and I do residential, so I would bow to his expertise and not expect good enough or thorough enough answers from him without his being involved in the deal. You will get some very good information from others on this site, but my feeling is that you will spend A LOT of time getting this right so it might profit you to locatge someone who specializes in this area.

Gotta agree with Ernie. Find someone who KNOWS this stuff. I cannnot tell you how many jobs I have gone into to find that home equipment was used for comercial use. Granted some times it can be ok ,dependent on application. But mostly they were just looking for a cheap way out. Churches are the biggest group of people who have this happen to them. I started out in Professional and commercial audio and video and lighting and have branched out into home. It has been a steep learning curve but lots of fun as well.

Not sure what advice your looing for... if your "Very Familiar" with the brands you listed, buo should have all the info you need to spec the right components..... Your description doesnt give us anything to go on as far as what we would spec.... Not that it would do much good as there is no way for us to understand the accoustics of the building and the overall goal of the rink owner. One thing you'll need to deal with is the reflections off the skating surface.... You'll need some ceiling panels to reduce reflections... Thats going to have to be mesured and speced accordingly.

As fars as speakers/power goes, I would probobly go with a Klipsch 70 Volt system and a QSC or Crown Amp.... Tap em around 30 watts to cover the area properly.... Depending on the speaker I would probobly go 1 speaker per 100-150 SQ ft. ANd probobly a few sub-woofers to boot.

Impaqt just reminded me of the most godawful system I ever heard.

I used to work for a hi fi chain in Los Angeles that made their own speakers, and the owner, while well aware that pro gear was a few steps of bulletproofness above his equipment, nonetheless wanted us to install a system in a skating rink when asked to.

We put in five speakers. In two corners along the long wall, we put in dual 12" dual horn-tweeter monsters. In the center of the opposite short wall we put in three 12" 3-way horn-tweeter speakers. The equipment was home all the way, and used a Phase Linear power amp that could put out 700 watts per channel. Or maybe it was only 350 -- it has been a long time. I wired the system in mono and series/paralleled the speakers for an OK impedance.

Oh, many times ! ! was I back there replacing the power amp with the backup they had to buy, replacing the 12" woofers (the ones in place had been frozen in the IN or in the OUT position, depending on which amp transistors had blown, placing about fifty volts DC across the drivers until they fried!

I had a corporation paying me to maintain this klooge, and they did so for about a year and a half.

Oh yeah -- it suffered from what I call The Woodstock Effect, where all the people in the area of the speakers essentially went deaf, but most of the people heard sound at a reasonable level, but with so much room reverberation that it was hard to tell if it was Doris Day or Frank Zappa.

SUBS!!!!!1 Oh yeah!!!!

Crown = no headache amp (love these guys)
Klipsch = Lots of sound with little distortion great intelligibility<-sp?
Depending on ammount of speakers and how inexpensive the owner wants to go, I would do multiple amps before I would go the 70V route. Just a personal prefrence.

Horns... Ewwww.... Good for PA systems..... Thats about it.... I forget the model number but Klipsch has a 70V version of the SA-3 that sounds great tapped anywhere from 10-30 Watts. The reason for 70V in a situation like this is pretty much wiring. You're probobly looking at a minumum of 20 speakers. Home running all those to separate amps is not so good in a commertial situation. You'll sacrifice some bass response (But not much if you upgrade to the AUdioPlex 70V Transformers) but the subs will pick that back up.... And subs definatly should NOT be 70 volt.. Hope that goes without saying.....

We have had great success doing combo 70 volt 8 ohm systems. Using 70 volt for the highs, we can wire easily from top to top; using a crossed over amp, we can drive subs all day long. It sounds great.

JBL Pro Control Contractor speakers have a number of options. The have a nice controller called the Soundzone. Crown amps have the option of having 70 volt off the left channel and 8 ohm off the right channel.

How many sources? Mic or telephone paging?

Don't forget QSC.



That is spelt correctly.


As mentioned in another response, the difference mainly has to do with wiring. With a 70 volt system, you daisy-chain, so initial wiring is easier. Also, if you need to add a speaker, you can splice into the chain any time anywhere as long as the total wattage tapped off at all the speakers does not exceed the wattage of your amp or your primary transformer.

Separate subs is definitely the killer idea, but you better get bulletproof ones, because someone is going to figure out how to connect a DJ to your system and some DJ is going to drop a needle on a record. Remember that roller rinks deal with audiences of all ages and some of the older ages like music that people already have on records, so a turntable and potential needle drop are realities.

Use limiters!!!!!!
This will save your client money and you service calls.
Hide and lock them so Mr.DJ can't do his own tweaking.

LOTS of power on the subs!!!
Front loaded cabinet requires twice the name plate rating of power. (good Power) Crown, QSC, Crest.

Almost forgot the QSC and totally forgot CREST!!! Love their stuff as well. Yeah lots of power to the subs and DEFINITELY a Comp/limiter. Good call gerald.
Like I said the multiple amps is personal preference and usually I have been lucky enough to have owners that have a liberal budget for sound and video.

Thanks for the confirmation on the spelling Ernie... English was my worst subject in school. I always seemed to leave my participles dangling.

I have had very good luck with Carvin eqpt.(Carvin.com)It is USA made and moderate in cost, and they can provide a full system from DJ or other mixer, EQ, limiters, and amps and speakers. The equipment is probably not quite as good as JBL or Crown in the noise,/distortion department, but in a skating rink no one is going to be complaining about the "imaging" not being perfect! Also construction is lighter, but in a fixed system, this won't matter