Roostering

Instead of hanging the fixture directly under the pipe, you "rooster" or "cock" it out an angle. Common on catwalks if don't have enough room between railings and need to get the fixture body pushed out further so you can focus it properly.

Sometimes used on lighting battens if you need to squeeze extra fixtures into a plot and don't have enough space between other fixtures -- but it does create problems in that if you have too many fixtures like that on a given pipe, their combined weight will cantilever the batten and cause the entire batten to roll. Makes it harder to focus because the pipe is more sensitive to movement and locking the fixtures' focus exactly where you want it and having it stay firmly there is tricky. Also runs the risk of fixtures clipping or getting clipped by other battens or curtains.

I hesitate to say it's definitively a bad practice because it has its uses, but you generally want to avoid it unless you have no other options.

Also -- if you have 10°, 5°, 15/30 or 25/50 zooms, definitely do not do it. The heavier weight of the fixtures and having a center of gravity farther away from the pipe will rack the yoke and cause it to bend and deform. It'll also more aggressively roll your batten.
 
Thanks for your response Mike. We had three zip strips on a pipe close to the ceiling yoked up to shoot back down to the cyc and we roostered each of the two c-clamps to make the pipe bold more accessable. Would you see a safety problem with that if the pipe bolt was securely fastened?
 
Feet is the yoke, body is the fixture.

D10831DD-12A8-4DF7-BF00-8E0E203677C6.jpeg
 
Feet is the yoke, body is the fixture.
In this particular case, shouldn't that be yolk? Yuk yuk yuk. :shifty:

@vitaltheatre , If I understand what you are doing, sounds acceptable. Some would argue that the clamp's pipebolt should always be on the bottom, but structurally, I don't think it matters. Mike's concern about the pipe rotating may or may not be valid, depending on how it's attached to its moorings. Of course, a safety cable at each end of each strip is mandatory. Do Zip Strips have an integral safety attachment point? I don't see anything among the sheets at https://www.altmanlighting.com/sp_faq/borderlights-micro-strip-r40-zip-strip/ . So two options: 1) thread the loop of the safety cable thru an unused hole in the hanging iron, then around the pipe and clipped to itself, or 2) the safety cable goes around both the pipe and the fixture and isn't actually attached to anything. Neither is great, each is better than nothing.

And BTW, rooster is one of the most vague and least-descriptive pieces of jargon ever to come down the pike. Unless one really means "clamp down, fixture above the pipe", "yoked out" or "yoked up" is clearer.
 
@derekleffew Thank you. Very helpful. I've experienced pipe rotating when cheeseborough is not secure. Not fun. I don't recall these zip strips having a intergral safety attachment point. And I can't recall if we put the safety cable around the connection to the truntion or the body of the unit. Your opiton about threading the cable through the unused hole in the hanging iron sound good, but I can't quite visualize that without looking at the unit. We'll have to try that next time.

Thanks for the link to the specs. Earlier today I was looking for old specs on the origin and design of the stage pin connector and theatrical lighting c-clamps. My google-fu is not the best. Please let me know if you can point me in the right direction to find them.

FYI: I only heard the term "rooster" for them first time today from an old-timer who works at Rosebrand. I asked him where he first heard it and he said it was so long ago he couldn't remember.

Thank you.
 
Never heard of "roostering.' It was always either down, out (at some angle, 90 deg. if not specifies, on a horizontal pipe) or up. Most of the "outs" were on vertical pipes tho.
 
1. Are you using hanging irons or trunnions? Normally, trunnions are only for floor mounting, although some people will drill a 1/2" hole in the bottom return (between the caster holes) to accommodate a c-clamp's yoke bolt. Depends on the manufacturer ad thickness of the sheet metal. Some is so thin I'm not sure it should even be used on the floor.
Of course with the extinction of incandescent strip lights the problem is resolving itself, but that just leads to more exciting problems. To wit: why does every manufacturer of LED batten-type lights think mounting hardware has to be so dang complicated? I understand the need for "gap-less" between strips, so tee handles on the sides are out, but seriously? Each manufacturer is more convoluted than the next. /rant off

2. There's a fair amount of info on the history and use of stage pin connectors here:
For c-clamps:

3. Old-timer should have retired, or at least stopped using a dumb term.;)
 
Never heard of "roostering.' It was always either down, out (at some angle, 90 deg. if not specifies, on a horizontal pipe) or up. Most of the "outs" were on vertical pipes tho.
Hear hear, Jon! Pretty sure it is/was a "New York Thing."
"I calls zit a rooster 'cause it was cocked."
@SteveB , @STEVETERRY ?
 
Well it made its way to the Midwest in my time and people say it out here sooooooooooo call Kenny Rogers cause it’s about to turn into a roast fest in here.
 
Nope, Never heard of it. Yoke, Side hang, top. never Rooster.
 
I definitely hear it pretty often here in the midwest. I think we're solidly onto a regional term. I wouldn't even come close to saying it is used exclusively, but I rarely run into someone in the area that isn't familiar with it.
 
I definitely hear it pretty often here in the midwest. I think we're solidly onto a regional term. I wouldn't even come close to saying it is used exclusively, but I rarely run into someone in the area that isn't familiar with it.

Yeah, that's where I learned it a decade ago. First time I heard it was from one of our 30-somethings stagehands who worked a lot with high schoolers and houses of worship. I always got the impression it was a euphemism for "cock it out" to avoid incurring dirty looks and jokes from students, similarly to the creative euphemisms people have come up with to get students to stop saying "f%@k nut" or "jesus nut" when they're talking about the pan bolt on a c-clamp.
 
We will hang instruments with sidearms 90* out on battens. Sometimes it’s to hang on the same batten as a teaser. Then we will use at least two sidearms on the battens, clamped to the batten with the arm straight up next to a line the batten hangs from. Then tie/secure the “stiffener” at the end of the sidearm to the line above the batten (about 18” up) to keep it from rolling. Worked a charm for 5 movers and for another production we had 11 Par64s and Source Fours. The heavier hangs would get 5-7 stiffeners.
 
I know rooster's and @vitaltheatre ... Do I know you? I see Vital is in a new home these days and from their original location Roostering isn't what I would have been worried about for safety... also a midwesterner originally... can't say I hear too many roosters here in the city, but it's not a term I'd be thrown off by.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Back