An open letter to the riggers of CB, however discontinuous and disconnected some of the thoughts it it may be:
Every so often I share stories of our rigging system and the pains it gives us. Here are some photos from my latest inspection of it.
The trim chains probably became misaligned after repeated occasions of snagging the line sets on the drop box cables, which are always in our way. There's really no place we can put our drop boxes where they aren't in the way.
When they're suspended with their corresponding electrics, the cables are in the way of scenery moving on and off stage and usually interfere with the immediately adjacent border curtains.
When they're setup on side booms, whether the booms are in line with the electrics or not, the cables are a major problem -- on one occasion a moving line set caught them and almost lift the side boom and the several fixtures on it clean off of the floor.
When we use them with our concert shell clouds to provide power for the ceiling lights (which were an add after the building had already been open a year), the cables get in the way of several line sets, leg curtains, and borders. This past week we've played dueling electrics several times, and I spent a lot of time in a scissor lift untangling drop box cable and feeder cable from each other and from battens and lift lines.
One way or another, those drop box cables will be torn out of the grid in the next decade, either intentionally or on accident.
I also enjoy the batten that was installed directly above the hanging hardware for our 2nd concert shell cloud. When the system was installed, a border curtain was installed there and we could occasionally feel the set get caught and always heard the pipe batten and the bottom pipe hit the against the shell's hardware. We've since removed the curtain from that batten and have permanently locked off that line set entirely. Luckily in the several months it took us to figure out the problem, the line set only ever half-unlocked our concert shell; had it unhinged both locks, the shell would've dropped into it's presentation orientation up at the grid and would've been a nightmare to fix.
Several things that irk me about the install:
+ All equipment in the install was downsized from the as-builts we were provided. Functionally, it means we are equipped to handle 1200lbs per counterweight set instead of 1350lbs, which will probably still satisfy any of the shows we'll ever do in here, but it means our drawings are a liability -- if anyone on our end should ever accidentally base a design decision on them or use them for reference, we're in big trouble (especially the ones that explicitly state our sets are rated for 1350lbs).
+ Battens were not installed with colored end caps.
+ Arbors were not installed with spreader plate stickers
+ Open holes at the grid were not marked (I've started spray painting them Safety Yellow, so no one falls through)
+ Our fire curtain has in one instance tripped without explanation, to which the rigger came in that afternoon stating, "There's always a reason!" and then left saying, "I could not determine what tripped it."
+ CAD drawings showing where line sets are located are not at all accurate. The rigger, at his discretion, installed sets differently than the drawings showed. The result was several months of arguing with the installer, who insisted their as-builts were accurate, despite me pointing out that there were huge discrepancies in the order in which line sets were installed and where they were located on stage and what they had attached to them. Instead of someone just stepping forward and saying, "Our documents that we have available do not accurately reflect the system as it was installed," we got, "I have no idea what you're talking about; the drawings are accurate." The installer actually emailed to me several time their record documents, and each time I had to respond back, "That's the drawing I already have, and I'm telling you it's wrong."
I see how an installer could argue that some of our problems are user-error, but things like our drop box cables are more a user-inconvenience. The fact that the cables have no sensible cable management to them is something that gives us headaches each and every time we use the system, and is one of those things that really should just work.
We haven't had any modifications to our system, we haven't added line sets, hung chain motors, or done anything wildly out of the norm. We've used the system as a system like this in at an educational/professional facility would be used, and in routine use of a well-designed system, the problems we're running into shouldn't be problems.
This week we'll be doing our first semi-complex rigging install in the last two and a half years we've been open, where I'll be dead hanging leg curtains off-stage for a special event we're having (where the entire audience is on stage with the cast for the show), but aside from that we've had school band concerts, a few dance shows, and occasionally a show will call for a few pieces of scenery to be hung, but as a testament to how little we've actually done with our rigging, there's maybe three bricks sitting on our loading bridge because almost all of our setups and strikes have not warranted a loader on the bridge, so we've never take the time to shuttle our counterweight inventory up to the loading bridge.
Most of these notes I've already given to the installer after 18 months or so of letting things cool down between them and I, and hopefully it'll be constructive for them, but money is money and they don't earn any more by preventing "user-inconvenience," but I've made it clear to them that over the next decade, it'll really surprise me if someone doesn't get hurt from the routine use of this system. With as many things clunking around and hitting each other as do in our system, I'll be genuinely amazed if something doesn't get knocked out of the air one of these days. Maybe it'll be a light fixture, maybe it'll be an entire curtain track, or maybe it'll be a shell cloud or a boom getting thrown over.
If I had to summarize my thoughts on this rigging system, I'd say that due to the way it's installed, it's impossibly difficult to manage and maintain all of the different moving parts. We should not have to dispatch a scissor lift to untangle feeder cable drops and drop box cables every time we want to setup the concert shell, nor should we have to run around on the grid re-centering trim chains all of the time because they're getting bopped around when a batten snags a drop box cable or hits against the adjacent line set's curtain track. (yes, adjacent, empty line sets are close enough to main and mid draws to knock the curtain tracks around).
So to all you riggers out there, please keep this in mind when you're performing an install. It may be only your job to get the system installed and ensure it's working until the moment you leave the room, but if you're not going to put forth a little effort to prevent user-inconvenience (or as you may sometimes call it, "user-error"), please don't bid on a project for me. I want a system that just works. I don't want a system that works only if for every 10-minute task, I have to spend another 30 minutes in a lift untangling your poorly "designed" rat's nest of cable drops.
Might it have initially cost a little more to add some better cable management? Probably, but we could've afforded it. As for the line sets ending up in the wrong places and too-tightly spaced together, battens not having bright-colored end caps, and that idler being installed and then never being used -- it would've cost almost exactly the same price to do the work correctly, but instead the work we got was just plain sloppy.
Every so often I share stories of our rigging system and the pains it gives us. Here are some photos from my latest inspection of it.
The trim chains probably became misaligned after repeated occasions of snagging the line sets on the drop box cables, which are always in our way. There's really no place we can put our drop boxes where they aren't in the way.
When they're suspended with their corresponding electrics, the cables are in the way of scenery moving on and off stage and usually interfere with the immediately adjacent border curtains.
When they're setup on side booms, whether the booms are in line with the electrics or not, the cables are a major problem -- on one occasion a moving line set caught them and almost lift the side boom and the several fixtures on it clean off of the floor.
When we use them with our concert shell clouds to provide power for the ceiling lights (which were an add after the building had already been open a year), the cables get in the way of several line sets, leg curtains, and borders. This past week we've played dueling electrics several times, and I spent a lot of time in a scissor lift untangling drop box cable and feeder cable from each other and from battens and lift lines.
One way or another, those drop box cables will be torn out of the grid in the next decade, either intentionally or on accident.
I also enjoy the batten that was installed directly above the hanging hardware for our 2nd concert shell cloud. When the system was installed, a border curtain was installed there and we could occasionally feel the set get caught and always heard the pipe batten and the bottom pipe hit the against the shell's hardware. We've since removed the curtain from that batten and have permanently locked off that line set entirely. Luckily in the several months it took us to figure out the problem, the line set only ever half-unlocked our concert shell; had it unhinged both locks, the shell would've dropped into it's presentation orientation up at the grid and would've been a nightmare to fix.
Several things that irk me about the install:
+ All equipment in the install was downsized from the as-builts we were provided. Functionally, it means we are equipped to handle 1200lbs per counterweight set instead of 1350lbs, which will probably still satisfy any of the shows we'll ever do in here, but it means our drawings are a liability -- if anyone on our end should ever accidentally base a design decision on them or use them for reference, we're in big trouble (especially the ones that explicitly state our sets are rated for 1350lbs).
+ Battens were not installed with colored end caps.
+ Arbors were not installed with spreader plate stickers
+ Open holes at the grid were not marked (I've started spray painting them Safety Yellow, so no one falls through)
+ Our fire curtain has in one instance tripped without explanation, to which the rigger came in that afternoon stating, "There's always a reason!" and then left saying, "I could not determine what tripped it."
+ CAD drawings showing where line sets are located are not at all accurate. The rigger, at his discretion, installed sets differently than the drawings showed. The result was several months of arguing with the installer, who insisted their as-builts were accurate, despite me pointing out that there were huge discrepancies in the order in which line sets were installed and where they were located on stage and what they had attached to them. Instead of someone just stepping forward and saying, "Our documents that we have available do not accurately reflect the system as it was installed," we got, "I have no idea what you're talking about; the drawings are accurate." The installer actually emailed to me several time their record documents, and each time I had to respond back, "That's the drawing I already have, and I'm telling you it's wrong."
I see how an installer could argue that some of our problems are user-error, but things like our drop box cables are more a user-inconvenience. The fact that the cables have no sensible cable management to them is something that gives us headaches each and every time we use the system, and is one of those things that really should just work.
We haven't had any modifications to our system, we haven't added line sets, hung chain motors, or done anything wildly out of the norm. We've used the system as a system like this in at an educational/professional facility would be used, and in routine use of a well-designed system, the problems we're running into shouldn't be problems.
This week we'll be doing our first semi-complex rigging install in the last two and a half years we've been open, where I'll be dead hanging leg curtains off-stage for a special event we're having (where the entire audience is on stage with the cast for the show), but aside from that we've had school band concerts, a few dance shows, and occasionally a show will call for a few pieces of scenery to be hung, but as a testament to how little we've actually done with our rigging, there's maybe three bricks sitting on our loading bridge because almost all of our setups and strikes have not warranted a loader on the bridge, so we've never take the time to shuttle our counterweight inventory up to the loading bridge.
Most of these notes I've already given to the installer after 18 months or so of letting things cool down between them and I, and hopefully it'll be constructive for them, but money is money and they don't earn any more by preventing "user-inconvenience," but I've made it clear to them that over the next decade, it'll really surprise me if someone doesn't get hurt from the routine use of this system. With as many things clunking around and hitting each other as do in our system, I'll be genuinely amazed if something doesn't get knocked out of the air one of these days. Maybe it'll be a light fixture, maybe it'll be an entire curtain track, or maybe it'll be a shell cloud or a boom getting thrown over.
If I had to summarize my thoughts on this rigging system, I'd say that due to the way it's installed, it's impossibly difficult to manage and maintain all of the different moving parts. We should not have to dispatch a scissor lift to untangle feeder cable drops and drop box cables every time we want to setup the concert shell, nor should we have to run around on the grid re-centering trim chains all of the time because they're getting bopped around when a batten snags a drop box cable or hits against the adjacent line set's curtain track. (yes, adjacent, empty line sets are close enough to main and mid draws to knock the curtain tracks around).
So to all you riggers out there, please keep this in mind when you're performing an install. It may be only your job to get the system installed and ensure it's working until the moment you leave the room, but if you're not going to put forth a little effort to prevent user-inconvenience (or as you may sometimes call it, "user-error"), please don't bid on a project for me. I want a system that just works. I don't want a system that works only if for every 10-minute task, I have to spend another 30 minutes in a lift untangling your poorly "designed" rat's nest of cable drops.
Might it have initially cost a little more to add some better cable management? Probably, but we could've afforded it. As for the line sets ending up in the wrong places and too-tightly spaced together, battens not having bright-colored end caps, and that idler being installed and then never being used -- it would've cost almost exactly the same price to do the work correctly, but instead the work we got was just plain sloppy.
