Help! Need to design a soundscape for my manufacturing plant

C

chweetah

Audiophyte
Hello friends. I'm new to the forum and I'm a pretty tech savvy guy though most of my expertise is in the video department as a former professional commercial video producer. I'm currently part owner of a manufacturing business with a 20,000 sq ft. assembly building. Right now we have 9 employees in their with their own 1980s ghetto blasters fighting for their radio stations to be heard above the fray. And me and the other owners are tired of it. So we are wanting to introduce a system in the shop that can play radio, podcasts, etc. off of a computer in the main office and start a programming job for HR to put some good stuff on there for the employees.

The building is 100' x 20'' and we have 7 Pillars down the center 25' from each other. Having no other knowledge I thought I'd get like a 7.1/2 amp with like 150W per channel, get a decent properly sized speaker for each pillar and put on on each pillar alternating the direction it points on ever-other pillar (East-West-East-West). And run speaker wire along the ceiling back into the offices on the North end.

So here are my ultimate questions:

1. I don't know if this is the best way to do this. If a 7.1 Amp would be able to power all the speakers, is there a setting where it plays to all the speakers evenly.

2. If or if not, is there a better way to do this that is inexpensive?

3. If you have any specific brands or models that would most efficiently get done what I need please suggest. For example, I don't need an amp that has video capability. I just need the most efficient basic amp that has the power to handle the speakers for the space I got. Any help from you all would be amazing!
 
Speedskater

Speedskater

Audioholic General
For a many speaker installation, use a 70 Volt system.
The 'parts-express.com' catalog has 8 pages in the Pro Audio 70V Commercial section.

As to how they work this RaneNote, enplanes all.
"Constant-Voltage Audio Distribution Systems"
http://www.rane.com/note136.html
 
C

chweetah

Audiophyte
Thanks Speedskater! I'll take a look and let you know if I have questions.
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
Thanks Speedskater! I'll take a look and let you know if I have questions.
Whatever you do, do not use a receiver. You do need pro gear and a 70 volt system will be best.

One issue though is that if this is a noisy shop floor, then adding a music system will add to the noise pollution and further damage everyone's hearing and will likely and should get you in trouble with OSHA.

If this is what I suspect it is, then you need to personalize the system with noise blocking headphones that can also provide background music.

Radio headphones with noise blocking features are probably going to be your best bet I suspect.
 
KenM10759

KenM10759

Audioholic Samurai
Having lived in the "Battle of the radios" for decades in various machine shops, I find the best way to deal with it is to ban them all. The only thing a shop sound system should be used for is company announcements and paging people.

I like music, don't get me wrong. It's just that no two people like all the same music...or dislike the same music. Shut it all off, donate the money you would have spent for a good pair of headphones for each person...to use at home.
 
C

chweetah

Audiophyte
I like the idea of getting rid of all music. But for the time being I'm overruled by my partners.

The shop isn't too noisy. It's a door assembly plant, so unless the press brake is running or the occasional fork lift we do well with noise. 20V power tools aren't that noisy.
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
I like the idea of getting rid of all music. But for the time being I'm overruled by my partners.

The shop isn't too noisy. It's a door assembly plant, so unless the press brake is running or the occasional fork lift we do well with noise. 20V power tools aren't that noisy.
If you are not going to get into some serious trouble and heavy OSHA fines you need data.

The maximal permissible A weighted sound pressure level in the work place is 85 db for an eight hour shift. I reckon for what you want to do to have the sound system have any value, you will add 10db to the noise floor. So your factory would need an average A weighted noise level of 75 db to make your plan at all viable. That is very quiet for a factory.

My advice is to spend a little money on a professional industrial noise exposure specialist, and have them do so reliable readings, with permanent read out. Then get their advice.

I'm pretty sure they are going to tell you this is a bad idea.

If you just forge ahead you have a good chance of being told to shut your system down.

If this is a metal building then all the reflections are going to come in the most damaging range.
 
S

shadyJ

Speaker of the House
Staff member
I used to work in a very noisy factory where hearing protection was required. Noise levels well over a 100 dB, depending on where you were in the factory floor, painfully loud, and in the bands hearing is very sensitive to, 1 kHz to 2 kHz. I was always very protective of my hearing and wore 30 dB+ earplugs from before I set foot in the plant to after I exited the floor, never took em off. Some guys there did not take their hearing very seriously though, in fact, one machinist I knew used over-ear headphones to drown out the very loud factory noise with music! Once in awhile they had all of our ears tested, and my audiograms always came out pretty good, with good sensitivity out past 18 kHz, but a lot of other guys who were just too cool for hearing protection had pretty bad results, rarely being able to hear above 10 kHz. Even the younger guys had audiogram results that were troubling, but no one there took them seriously except for a handful of people.
 
M

MrBoat

Audioholic Ninja
Seniority rules. We have music in our shop but I have been there the longest and it's just ambient so I control the content and the volume. I've had new guys bring in boxes and get all feeling to home but I don't allow it. It's not a democracy. Phones are next to go.
 
highfigh

highfigh

Seriously, I have no life.
Hello friends. I'm new to the forum and I'm a pretty tech savvy guy though most of my expertise is in the video department as a former professional commercial video producer. I'm currently part owner of a manufacturing business with a 20,000 sq ft. assembly building. Right now we have 9 employees in their with their own 1980s ghetto blasters fighting for their radio stations to be heard above the fray. And me and the other owners are tired of it. So we are wanting to introduce a system in the shop that can play radio, podcasts, etc. off of a computer in the main office and start a programming job for HR to put some good stuff on there for the employees.

The building is 100' x 20'' and we have 7 Pillars down the center 25' from each other. Having no other knowledge I thought I'd get like a 7.1/2 amp with like 150W per channel, get a decent properly sized speaker for each pillar and put on on each pillar alternating the direction it points on ever-other pillar (East-West-East-West). And run speaker wire along the ceiling back into the offices on the North end.

So here are my ultimate questions:

1. I don't know if this is the best way to do this. If a 7.1 Amp would be able to power all the speakers, is there a setting where it plays to all the speakers evenly.

2. If or if not, is there a better way to do this that is inexpensive?

3. If you have any specific brands or models that would most efficiently get done what I need please suggest. For example, I don't need an amp that has video capability. I just need the most efficient basic amp that has the power to handle the speakers for the space I got. Any help from you all would be amazing!
I'm having a hard time seeing that seven columns down the center of a 100' long building are 25' apart.

With 9 employees, you're likely to have arguments over what kind of music is played, so you'll want to survey them to find their top 5 styles and then, get input about what kind of music they hate to hear- you don't want them to be listening when they're on the clock, especially with tools and forklifts. I wouldn't have them wearing headphones with a forklift in the area unless it has a flashing light.

How high is the roof's structure? If it's supported with trusses and isn't more than 15' high, I would recommend using a speaker on each side of the columns. You'll need to decide on the budget, but don't worry for a second about stereo, don't worry about great sound and forget everything you know about setting up a music system- this is distributed audio and even coverage within a certain group of specs is what you need and that includes SPL, dispersion and frequency response. Also, don't worry about speaker wire- this can be installed with 16ga but it needs to meet commercial electrical code requirements.

Personally, I think it will save a lot of time if you just hire an audio contractor. Make sure they have experience in 70V systems- some will install it but won't really understand it well.
 
C

chweetah

Audiophyte
Folks,
After talking with my partners we decided that we are going to provide the system because a little ambiance is nice. On the floor one of my partners who manages said the current situation is annoying with the competing radios. And we could squash it completely by banning them but we'd rather provide this for our employees. Our factory is in the country so basically there are two kinds of music genres anybody cares about... classic rock and country. If I can feel this system off the audio jack on a computer it will be super easy to create some pandora channels or whatever to make it better. The reason why we have competing radios is as much about certain radios being capbable to tune different stations in different parts of a metal building a good distance from the closest station/tower than it is anything else. As far as the audio, and noise level etc. we already have that. I think this will fix that issue by "nationalizing" it. And if we aren't in compliance we can solve that by turning it off no biggie.

I like the idea of the 70W system. But I don't want to pay more than $700 for the equipment. And I really want to just do the install myself as the nearest decent sized town is 40 miles away (We are in rural Nebraska)... we'd have to have someone drive a long distance to do this. Is it really all that different than doing a 7.1 surround sound system? I can't imagine it would be hard. Is there just a bunch of mono terminals that send the same signal to each speaker or what?
 
slipperybidness

slipperybidness

Audioholic Warlord
Folks,
After talking with my partners we decided that we are going to provide the system because a little ambiance is nice. On the floor one of my partners who manages said the current situation is annoying with the competing radios. And we could squash it completely by banning them but we'd rather provide this for our employees. Our factory is in the country so basically there are two kinds of music genres anybody cares about... classic rock and country. If I can feel this system off the audio jack on a computer it will be super easy to create some pandora channels or whatever to make it better. The reason why we have competing radios is as much about certain radios being capbable to tune different stations in different parts of a metal building a good distance from the closest station/tower than it is anything else. As far as the audio, and noise level etc. we already have that. I think this will fix that issue by "nationalizing" it. And if we aren't in compliance we can solve that by turning it off no biggie.

I like the idea of the 70W system. But I don't want to pay more than $700 for the equipment. And I really want to just do the install myself as the nearest decent sized town is 40 miles away (We are in rural Nebraska)... we'd have to have someone drive a long distance to do this. Is it really all that different than doing a 7.1 surround sound system? I can't imagine it would be hard. Is there just a bunch of mono terminals that send the same signal to each speaker or what?
70V systems likely aren't necessarily more difficult than 7.1HT, but it is a completely different animal. There won't be many on this site that can help you out here, but there will likely be a few. TLS is likely going to be the best resource on here. He does make some very valid points to consider, before even getting to the nuts and bolts of system install.
 
newsletter

  • RBHsound.com
  • BlueJeansCable.com
  • SVS Sound Subwoofers
  • Experience the Martin Logan Montis
Top