Home to the French Stade Toulousain rugby union team and its 19 title wins, the 19,500-capacity Stade Ernest-Wallon in Toulouse recently completed a complete technical upgrade. Key to the new installation are DAS loudspeakers, Powersoft amplification and Dante networking. 

The club approached local audiovisual installation company Triaxe – having previously called on the company for a screen system – to find the best solution at the best price. The decision was for an advanced Powersoft Ottocanali system and a selection of DAS speaker systems.

The problems for the Stade Toulousain had begun when some of their existing amps started to fail. Losing channels during a Second Division rugby match, the management knew they had to act quickly before the new season.

They were fortunate in that the 2015 Rugby World Cup gave them a break for a month in September, when they were able to begin work.

As Axente distributes both Powersoft and DAS Audio Technical Director Christophe Carles began by modelling the stadium using Ease predictive and visualisation software. Working with Axente, Triaxe designed a cost-effective and economic PA system using five Powersoft eight-channel Ottocanali 8K4 to drive 76 DAS Audio WR8826 DX IP65-rated 80° x 80° dispersion loudspeakers. The Ottocanali 8K4 delivers 1kW/channel into 4Ω (600W into 8Ω) and the sound is processed through DAS Audio’s DSP-2060A processing.

The speakers are hung in clusters of two – one angled back at the upper tier, and the other at the lower stand. These are mounted around the lip of the stadium roofs’ while in both corners of the C-shaped stands there is an additional cluster of three speakers.

The sound was zoned using a pair of Yamaha matrices managing the routing. Aside from ensuring intelligibility for the crowds, the Stade Toulousain also wanted to put the players ‘in the zone’ as they emerged from the tunnel onto the pitch providing high SPL to help motivate them to the atmosphere – an increasingly common use of psycho-acoustics.

The speaker system is made of 16 clusters of two WR8826DX boxes for the opposite stand (the I-shaped stand) and 19 clusters of two speakers for the C-shaped stand. On top of that there’s a further cluster of three WR8826DX speakers in each curve of the C-shaped stand.

Two Ottocanali 8K4 amps feed the I-shaped stand (two speakers per channel in 8Ω), while the other three Ottocanali 8K4 amps cater for the C-shaped stand (with two speakers per channel at 8Ω). Both areas use a DSP2060A processor which, combined with a standard programme limiter and a D-Max clip limiter, provides advanced protection for the speakers. 

Axente recommended DAS Audio WR8826 DX speakers because of their power-to-size ratio. Although they are relatively small and use 6-inch speakers, they can deliver low frequencies and don’t overload as spectrum optimisation is managed by the DSP2060A processor. In addition, the speakers are IP55- rated for outdoor use.

‘The choice of Powersoft was an easy one,’ says Pierre Carrère, Co-owner of Triaxe. ‘Ottocanali is dedicated to the installation market, and having eight channels allowed us to save space and save power, while the audio quality speaks for itself. This was important because the technical rooms are quite small.’

Triaxe also new that by standardising on Powersoft they could achieve a homogeneous and coherent solution.

Other difficulties included a short time frame, since the installation had to be completed before the start of the new season, and that a specification had to be drawn up from scratch: ‘The installation team worked day in day out, 30 hours in a row to make sure everything was ready in time – including running a cable path measuring a total of 2.5km around the underside of the stadium roof,’ says Triaxe Project Manager, Olivier Jantin.

The work was completed and handed over at 11am on the morning of the first match: ‘The installation team was fantastic’ says up Assistant Stadium Manager, Paul Catuffe. He confirms that the intelligibility is now first-class and security announcements can be heard clearly, as messages are triggered from the Yamaha matrix, which automatically cuts the main loudspeaker sound.

Vincent Bonnet, Development Director for the Stade Toulousain, adds that the requirement for homogenised sound, from the seats nearest the pitch right to the upper tribunes, had been met. ‘There were many other companies prepared to offer specs, brands and simulations, which made decision making difficult,’ he says, ‘but we knew Triaxe were a local company that we could trust. They explained how the system would work and even rigged a demo system for us to hear. We also wanted something that was functional and easy to use and this is perfectly adapted to what we wanted, where it could be operated technician free.’

However, Triaxe knew that from an acoustic perspective the stadium had not been badly designed: ‘After they gave the go-ahead we were confident we could meet the requirement but they had to wait until the end to hear the end result; they didn’t know what they could expect so fortunately they are really satisfied,’ Jantin reports.

As far as source inputs are concerned, the public is entertained via radio mics (with a wired backup) and music (sourced from a Mac), as well as a siren that signals half time and full time, and is triggered automatically through a PC.

The new system was optimised and accepted in November 2015. Final tweaks were carried out as the first crowds thronged into the stadium to cater for the difference of sound with a full stadium. Since then it has operated problem free. Health checks are routinely carried out and set the system for the weekend (two or three days in advance of home matches). ‘The system is very good, exactly what they expected,’ Jantin confirms. Levels can manually be reduced when the stadium is only half full.

The Stade Toulousain is now completely adaptable, and in addition to rugby and football event, it is also set to host Nitro Circus. ‘Everyone has noticed and remarked on the improved quality of sound, sponsors included,’ concludes Paul Catuffe. ‘Even the local newspapers reported on the quality of the new sound system.’