With a complete refurbishment only recently completed, the Spa Resort Hawaiians suffered badly during the earthquake and tsunami of March 2011.A water resort in Japan’s Fukishima prefecture, the spa immediately to rebuild, including replacing its QSC Installation Line Array (ILA) Loudspeaker System.

QSC distributor Onkyo Tokki Ltd (OTK) was responsible for the original ILA installation as well as the reconstruction work. The entertainment area at the spa, which hosts evening Hula dance and Polynesian live music events, is located behind an indoor lido pool area, and is surrounded on three sides by two-tiered audience seating with a capacity of 700 people.

Prior to the refurbishment, the resort’s management was unsatisfied with the sound of the original PA. Due to the expansion of the entertainment area over the years, the existing 14-year-old system no longer provided even sound dispersion across the seating area. The managers needed it a system capable of achieving consistent coverage, laterally and vertically.

OTK recommended the QSC ILA as both the most efficient and cost-effective solution for the resort. As the ILA provides 140° horizontal range of coverage, no out fills or centre clusters were needed, further minimising cost and complexity. OTK installed 12 WL2082-i loudspeakers and two pairs of WL118-sw subwoofers. A dedicated SC28 system controller was chosen to optimise the performance of the system, in which the speakers were driven four-way (three-way plus subs) by a combination of QSC PowerLight PL325 and PL340 amplifiers.

Installed in two arrays mounted 5m from the ground, one on either side of the stage and each consisting of six WL2082-i elements and a pair of WL118-sw subs, the stage sound system succeeded in reproducing on-stage sound with vastly improved clarity and presence, delivering it evenly to every seat in the house – even the rear seats on the top tier, which are around 30 metres away from the twin QSC arrays.

Following the earthquake, reconstruction at Spa Resort Hawaiians took just under a year. According to OTK, the goal of the reconstruction work was to restore the systems at the resort to the state they were in the day before the disaster, and this was achieved by the time the resort reopened in February. To the delight of OTK’s engineers, when the structural works on the resort following the earthquake were complete, the QSC ILA and its constituent elements were found to be in full working order, requiring no repairs.

More: www.qscaudio.com
More: www.otk.co.jp