Florida-based Thunder City Pro has placed Calrec’s modular Type R mixing system at the heart of its line of Bolt mobile production units.

Needing to cover everything from live sporting events and concerts to corporate conferences, Bolt can be ordered with a pre-designed floor plan, pre-integrated with equipment. Thunder City Pro offers custom design services, offering design custom mobile units to meet individual clients’ requirements.

Developed for content producers seeking smaller production vehicles with no compromise on features, the Bolt concept is designed to be cost-effective to build and run, and is available in compact 16ft, 24ft and 32ft models.

Thunder City Pro President Justin Stancil says the decision to standardise with Type R plays into this unique concept. ‘We needed a compact, yet powerful audio console with plenty of customisable screen real estate, and the Type R is the perfect mix of compact modularity and expandability. Not only can we licence the console with precisely the amount of DSP resources we need, but its processing core hardware is exactly the same no matter how it is licensed.

‘Furthermore, having the flexibility of adding or re-arranging hardware panels really makes the platform future proof, and it is expandable when the client is ready to grow. Its modular PoE panels also make it easy to adapt to any number of configurations; we can easily and cleanly install any combination of Large Soft Panel, Small Soft Panel and Type R fader panels to meet the specific needs of any client.’

In addition to providing turnkey production services to broadcast and entertainment clients, Thunder City Pro provides creative services, technical crews, and ongoing service and support. Its customers range from the University of South Florida to Major League Baseball teams like the Tampa Bay Rays and the Baltimore Orioles.

Stancil says that Type R’s modular nature helps facilitate more flexible workflows to this wide range of clients: ‘We love that Type R is SMPTE 2110 native, but Calrec’s modular I/O also makes it easy to interface with other audio flavours such as Madi, Dante, AES, and analogue. Calrec’s modular I/O includes Madi and Dante cards, which means while the link between the core and modular I/O is native IP, we can take de-embedded audio into the Type R from our Evertz Nexx router, and embed audio into the Nexx router from the Type R.

‘We can use Dante to link analogue audio to the digital Dante I/O that is deployed in the field, while Calrec’s crosspoint router can act as an audio router in addition to the Nexx router. It means we can route between Madi, Dante, and the console without necessarily having to use DSP resources.’

Type R also gives Thunder City Pro remote capabilities via Calrec Assist, Type R’s browser-based user interface. ‘We love having a web UI for Type R control; not only can the A1 and EIC use it locally to program the console and to monitor audio levels, but it means we can offer low-latency remote support from our Technical Operations Centre (TOC) in Saint Petersburg, Florida whenever our clients need additional help,’ Stancil says.

‘This is the first US installation of Type R in a truck, and it fits Thunder City’s brief perfectly,’ says Calrec Regional Sales Manager Dave Lewty. ‘It dovetails nicely with Bolt’s flexible nature, allowing the client to define both hardware and processing elements to meet their exact requirements, and enabling Thunder City Pro to deliver a powerful and modular audio console in the most compact of spaces.’