ON THE ROAD: Viva Elvis
“Stage Technologies have been absolutely incredible as always...”
another dimension and allow the creation of Stage Technologies has been working with
smaller scenes without using the larger sets. Cirque for the past 10 years and Anderson was
This ability to do multiple configurations full of praise for the company’s work: “Stage
played a large part in the development of the Technologies have been absolutely incredible
show. The furthest upstage lift is C5, the 80’ x with us as always. They are absolutely at the
20’ workhorse of the show, used the most to top of the list of main suppliers for the show
bring up all the largest pieces of scenery. — from theatrical infrastructure on the tracks
Downstage of C1 are two 8’ x 8’ star and trolleys, to the automated control system
traps that travel between stage level and the that we’re running at FOH, to all the laser-
basement. The C1 lift and the star trap holes are guided elements.
covered by SLOATS (Sliding Lifting Automated “They’re also busy on the production side
Traps) when the lifts are down. The lifts are all and were very involved in a lot of the scenic
powered by rack and pinion motors (mounted elements that we built. Had they not been with
on the lifts themselves). The three largest lifts us 100% on this one we would have been in
are all counterweighted. a world of trouble! We’ve had half of their UK
shop and almost all of their Vegas shop working
WINCH FARM with us for the past year.”
There are 66 Stage Technologies winches used
in the show, 54 of which are housed in the AUTOMATION
‘winch farm’ on the grid which, because of Head of automation, Galen Price gave an
the length of the cable drops (the grid is 104’ overview of his department’s work: “I have
above the stage and 200’ above the basement), a wide range of electrical/electronic and
provided a cable management challenge mechanical skill sets with my crew, so where
regarding guiding them and keeping them rigging is specialised, they just do one bit of it
straight — the stage configuarion meant they but we can actually take a lot more.
could only have guide columns on the four “We maintain everything on the grid and
corners. make sure that everything before it leaves
Mike Anderson pointed out that their the drum is perfectly safe — the motor, the
tolerances are down to 0.1875”, so all the gearbox, the encoder — so that all its limits are
winches had to be lined up because there set.
is a zero fleet angle and the drum travels “Stage Technologies have a product
instead of the cable which always stays exactly development partnership with Siemens who
perpendicular. supplied all components for the motor control
The maximum load capacity on an average cabinets which have a main brain and two
winch is 2,000lbs on a normal scenic unit sub data boards that control all the inputs and
though the massive Gotta Lotta set is on a triple outputs of the four computers plus a bunch of
purchase system lifted off of nine separate relays. It’s got a touch screen so I can tell what
dedicated winches, none of which can go weight is on each one of these hoists, and gives
out of sync by more than 5mm or it shuts the us feedback from the winches and checks all
system down. The LED truss uses four winches, kinds of errors before a winch is allowed to
travels up to 52” below the grid and drops move.
down up to 60”. “If I lose this cabinet and the Gotta Lotta set
TPi FEBRUARY 2010 • 29
Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76