Concert Tech on Trains

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Dan Richardson

Freshman
Apr 30, 2012
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Bennett Prescott said:
This sounds like a super cool application that you need to tell us more about. With pictures!
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Your wish, my command. Rather than swerve that thread, I'm starting a new one.

Guy I work with runs tiny music festivals on chartered vintage train cars. Typically 4 or 5 1940s Pullman cars: 2 or 3 sleepers, a dome dining car, and a club car that I convert into a venue. 3 or 4 performers and 50 audience members. We've done a bunch of them across Canada and LA to Seattle. Coming up I have one from Chicago to New Orleans. Concerts, workshops, open mics, jam sessions, everything happens on the train.

Jimmy Dale Gilmore, shows the stage setup pretty well

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Bit more crowded, with Rick Shay, Dave Alvin, Chris Smithers, and Peter Case.

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Me in the booth, with Thad Beckman looking on while Jon Langford plays.

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Here's a video of Thad singing a song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWqoPjcmEcg
 
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re: Concert Tech on Trains

One of the issues I have is that people want to sit up in the dome car but still hear what's going on in the club car. We have run wires between the cars, but that's sketchy and not always possible. WIFI can't blast through all that steel. I had hopes for powerline ethernet and streaming, but the train runs high voltage and each car has a stepdown transformer, and the powerline ethernet doesn't work through transformers. I'm looking for ideas. Bonus points if I can get video across as well.
 
re: Concert Tech on Trains

Yep, LS9-16. Airfader on the laptop running the LS9. Remoter VNC on the iPad running the laptop. StageMix wasn't quite up to the task yet.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

Dan Richardson said:
One of the issues I have is that people want to sit up in the dome car but still hear what's going on in the club car. We have run wires between the cars, but that's sketchy and not always possible. WIFI can't blast through all that steel. I had hopes for powerline ethernet and streaming, but the train runs high voltage and each car has a stepdown transformer, and the powerline ethernet doesn't work through transformers. I'm looking for ideas. Bonus points if I can get video across as well.
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Why not use a real wireless platform, like from Lectrosonics, or repurpose an IEM rig?
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

Caleb Dick said:
Sennheiser and Lectro both have options. The hard part is video, unless it's highly compressed and latency isn't a concern.
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Well then, why not one of the high-power business Wifi devices with a huge external antenna mounted on top of the car? I mean if you're going to go 'pro' you might as well go all the way.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

I've got IEMs. Never occurred to me to try. Longer waves are better at getting through obstacles aren't they? Maybe that VHF gear in the back of the warehouse could be of some use. On the other hand, a steel dome car is pretty much a Faraday cage. I wish arranging a field test was a little less non-trivial.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

These are lovingly restored private cars that we charter. I don't get to mount things on them or drill holes in them.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

Dan Richardson said:
I've got IEMs. Never occurred to me to try. Longer waves are better at getting through obstacles aren't they? Maybe that VHF gear in the back of the warehouse could be of some use. On the other hand, a steel dome car is pretty much a Faraday cage. I wish arranging a field test was a little less non-trivial.
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perhaps you can get the transmit antenna and receive antenna for whatever you are wanting to use somehow 'outside the cage'. maybe antennas with some sort of magnetic mount would work? you're only needing to jumpa few feet between cars so the type of antenna probably wouldn't be all that critical. or those old cell phone antennas that they used to put on car windows? just trying to think outside the box[car] here...
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

Looks like a nice project. A couple years ago I took the Coast Starlight train from Seattle to LA in a sleeper car and it was a very pleasant experience. On the technical side, I'm curious why you went with 2 speakers on sticks instead of just one up the middle. The entire audience is sitting on either side of the aisle so I would think that maybe the viewing angles would be a little better with one stick up the middle. And acoustically, the combing would be limited to the bounce off the ceiling and the soffits on the sides. But maybe I'm not seeing it from all angles. I suspect it's tricky no matter how you do it.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

brian maddox said:
you're only needing to jumpa few feet between cars so the type of antenna probably wouldn't be all that critical.
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There might be 20 feet of rooms between my mix position and the end of the car, and no holes to access the outside. True, I can run antennae lead down the hall, but think corporate sensibilities. The powerline ethernet non-solution was so tidy. I like the cell radio antennae idea. Those were inductive or something? I'm doing handwaving here, I have no idea how that works.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

drew gandy said:
I'm curious why you went with 2 speakers on sticks instead of just one up the middle.
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I've done it lots of ways. One on one side, several distributed, a pair as you see them. Access to the stage is in the center in the car the pictures were taken in. It's a pair of facing booths. A tripod would block the entrance completely. Also, some players stand up, and the speaker would be in their face. I used K12s for a while, which was sweet, because when they're on the down-tilt setting, their tops are parallel to the ground. I put foam on top the speaker, run the stand up, and spread the legs to tension it. Everything wedges into place, and the speakers don't budge when the train hits a chunk of bad track. I add a band clamp above the normal clamp. However, I couldn't find anyone to rent me K12s in LA, and hauling them out on the plane was a nuisance. These in the pictures are Nexo 10s that I rent but don't like much. They shoot straight out. With the horn jammed against the ceiling, the phase cancellation of the ceiling bounce is not as big an issue as one might think. I'm seriously considering trying the new Mackie DLM8, and going back to bringing them as checked baggage. I've also bought a Mackie DL1608, which will replace the LS9 that I always carry.

I suspect it's tricky no matter how you do it.
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Exactly. Compromises on top of compromises, squeezed into the situation. Always interesting, though. Thanks for the input.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

Do they have any extra intercom lines? Maybe some sort of digital encoding or baluns, 10 base T would run over cat 3.
Another convoluted solution: use your plugin network extenders internal to each car to get to a location you can have an external wifi antenna.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

No comm at all. They use radios, which, now that I think about it, is another vote for VHF or UHF, isn't it? Video's not a requirement, just a bonus.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

I'm curious why you went with 2 speakers on sticks instead of just one up the middle.
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Isn't this the the perfect situation for the Bose L1-system?

If your cellphone works inside then it isn't a faradays cage at least.

I've used iem's for audio transfer to odd places. If you have some paddle antenna - Even better.

And as for using cellphone. Since you have no latency issues you may get away with mobile internet unless the coverage sucks.

Using wifi router/repeater with some small directional antennas should work quite well, unless your cellphones doesn't work inside the car. Or you can run some thin rg-59 to the exit door or window and use a magnetic antenna outside (under?) the car for obstacle free path.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

Dan Richardson said:
No comm at all. They use radios, which, now that I think about it, is another vote for VHF or UHF, isn't it? Video's not a requirement, just a bonus.
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From what I remember from my days of being obsessed by trains as a kid (come on, we all were once), VHF or UHF should be able to penetrate at least one car. If you can't put the receiver inside the dome (which does tend to be very EVIL when it comes to WiFi), you could always jump the few yards across the gap into the next car and run a wire up to the dome, per safety guidelines.

Robert Lofgren said:
Isn't this the the perfect situation for the Bose L1-system?
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I disagree here- far too much reflection off the narrow sides of the car. According to the Bose website, they are capable of "delivering 180-degree coverage" and as far as I know that can't be changed. If you had it hung horizontally across the top however... :p naaahhhh that's a bad idea.
 
Re: Concert Tech on Trains

I second doing this with an IEM transmitter to a WL receiver. I have done it using Sennheiser SR 350 IEM G2 transmitters(these can be tweaked to 250mW) and Sennheiser Evolution G2/G3 receiver. You should not need to get antennas outside for such a short hop if you get a directional antenna on the IEM transmitter.
 
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