AC-ET has really delivered the goods for us on this project. Mike, Jono and the staff provided an exceptionally high level of service and attention to detail in every aspect of the project, including the quotation, specification, customisation, logistics, timing, delivery, cataloguing, training and technical support for the equipment.
Said Steve Morrison, Deputy Operations Manager Technical
Replacing the Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Centre (AECC), P&J Live offers state-of-the-art, world-class conference & exhibition facilities for organisers and delegates across the globe, as well as a massive performance arena – all under one roof.
Located next to Aberdeen International Airport and with excellent domestic transport connections, the venue is expected to become a major events hub. The £333 million, purpose-built development is the single largest UK investment of its kind and includes a 4-Star Hilton Hotel, 150-seater restaurant and sustainable energy centre onsite – providing truly 21st century amenities.
Operated and managed by ASM Global, P&J Live features 48,000 sq. metres of flexible, multi-purpose floor space across its main Arena and Baker Hughes Exhibition and Conference Hub.
Designed to provide clients with premier lighting & AV production services in-house, when it came to delivering a state-of-the-art technical infrastructure for the venue’s exhibition, conference & banquet spaces, it was essential to invest in the most up-to-date technologies available.
Following a series of demos and discussions, AC-ET was awarded supply of venue-wide loose equipment & flexible house lighting for the spaces, which include: 6,000 sqm of multi-purpose exhibition & event halls sub-divisible into three 2,000 sqm rooms – including banqueting capacity for 1,250 guests on round tables; four conference suites of over 1,500 sqm of sub-divisible space for lectures & seminars, classroom-based training sessions, board meetings, banquet and cabaret events with a side / end stage and dance floor; plus 33,000 sqm of 7.5m high subterranean car park space available for events if required.
The overall day-to-day management of this huge, months-long project was handled on AC-ET’s side by the highly experienced Mike Docksey in the company’s external sales team, and on P&J Live’s side by the equally knowledgeable Deputy Operations Manager Technical, Steve Morrison.
Mike worked closely with AC-ET’s UK Sales & Purchasing Director, Jonathan Walters and the in-house lighting, rigging, audio, video and cable divisions’ product experts to quote on or assist with, the specification of thousands of individual product lines. The project also involved collaboration with the venue’s team of in-house production experts, who provide dedicated technical services & support for each event.
One of the largest single client orders received by AC-ET, the project took full advantage of the company’s position as a single-source supplier of entertainment lighting, rigging, video, audio, power & distro, cabling & consumables technologies – and its access to large stocks of the latest product lines from many industry-leading brands in a portfolio of over 200.
Over 30 marques were supplied, including Chroma-Q®, PROLIGHTS, Tourflex® Cabling, SIXTY82, Green Hippo, Panasonic, Draper, Analog Way, Doughty, Avolites, Robe, Tourmate, Sony, Datapath, Shure, Columbus McKinnon, Gravity, and Wireless Solutions.
With the scale of equipment involved, and tight lead times both during the quotation and supply stages, it was a major logistical challenge to deliver the thousands of items in time to meet the venue’s official opening date and client events already booked.
The impressive lighting infrastructure features over 900 lighting fixtures, the majority of which are energy-efficient LED sources. Over 140 Chroma-Q fixtures include Color Force II™ LED cyc & wash battens, and the first DMX version of the Inspire™ RGBW LED house & theatrical lighting system, which can be re-configured on movable truss for banquet, cabaret and other events. In addition, over 700 PROLIGHTS fixtures cover the majority of other lighting requirements. Pixie WashXB moving LED wash lights provide high quality table and atmospheric lighting for large events alongside Lumipix16H battens. The extensive list of other PROLIGHTS LED units includes moving profiles, ellipsoidals, Fresnels, PARs and battery uplighters.
The fixtures are mounted on over 300 pieces of SIXTY82 truss and corners permanently or temporarily installed in each space. AC-ET also supplied a quantity of Columbus McKinnon Lodestar D8 Model L chain hoists, plus Doughty equipment, trigger clamps and safety bonds.
The equally state-of-the-art video infrastructure features 15 Panasonic HD projectors ranging from 3-chip laser to single chip models; Draper modular projector screens including a custom-made 11.5m wide x 4m high StageScreen and several sizes of FocalPoint 16:9 screens; a Green Hippo Hippotizer Karst+ Media Server; plus Analog Way, Black Magic and Datapath signal switcher, processing, converter and splitter solutions.
Other equipment supplied includes over 60 Shure vocal, lectern & drum microphones; audio stageboxes and microphone stands; flightcases for lighting and AV products; custom meat racks for lighting fixtures; and a plethora of consumables, accessories and tools.
In addition, the Tourflex® Cabling service supplied nearly 5,000 custom assemblies using 24km of cable and nearly 13,000 connectors, with the ‘TECA’ site logo shrink-wrapped onto every cable and laser engraved onto every connector. The assemblies include Tourflex Datasafe™ DMX & Ethernet, Tourmate Powersafe™ & Tourmate Multilock™ mains power, and various other product lines for the venue’s lighting, rigging, video and audio infrastructure.
Every cable is colour-coded by length to enable easy stock management, and is a custom item with its own product spec. and manufacturing code for tracking purposes. The bespoke options included a number of custom distribution boxes as well.
