GOP Sounds Out Convention Acoustics
July 28 -- No matter how many hours Republicans may spend fine-tuning their speeches for next week’s convention, they’ll need the help of a little physics to make sure their messages get across.
“I have one of those jobs where if I do my job well, no one notices,” says Jack Randorff, a physicist and director of acoustics for the 2000 Republican National Convention. “It’s when they notice my work that you know I’ve got a problem.”
Randorff, who operates an acoustics consulting business in Lubbock, Texas, has been in Philadelphia since mid-July tweaking the interiors of the First Union Center, where about 45,000 people are expected to gather next week. The din of so many voices can easily obscure the words of any speaker and it’s Randorff’s job to ensure that GOP presidential candidate George W. Bush’s words aren’t lost in the raucous clamor of political shop talk.
Stir of Echoes
Chatter won’t be the only kind of noise pollution around the center. The building, home to the city’s basketball and ice hockey teams, was designed to hold about half the number of people expected next week. More bodies mean more heat, so crews have imported 400 tons of extra diesel-powered air-conditioning units. These units have been placed outside the building and will pump cool air into the auditorium through ducts.
“That has the potential for creating a lot of noise,” says Randorff. “Noise is fine in a sporting event, but at a convention, it’s a whole other matter.”
To improve sound in the center, Randorff first focused on the concrete surfaces that line the arena’s front walls. He likens the effect of these concrete surfaces to “an oversized bathtub.” The walls reflect sound and create reverberation, or echoes.
To soften that effect, crews unrolled bales of fiberglass insulation and attached them to the sides of the walls. Fluffy-side-out, the insulation effectively absorbs sounds. And since the sight of insulation doesn’t exactly create a presidential aura, workers hung large, blue drapes over the walls to hide the fuzzy fiberglass.
Trending Reader Picks
ABC News Live