The shop removed the glass doors to access the shell of the building and insert the new video boards. From there, they set them up on a network, closed up the wall, and waterproofed the system with new cladding.
Once the boards were ready, LED Solutions prepared for their installation by removing the eight heavy glass doors which covered the old poster boards. Since the client had no further use for them, they were brought to Hamilton for storage and potential reuse.
With the doors removed, the team found themselves inside the building’s facade, in a 127-mm (5-in.) deep box with an aluminum frame and fibreglass insulation. However, at this stage, they were presented with a challenge. On the other side of the wall was a dance recital hall, lined with soundproof material. Under no circumstances could they drill through to the other side to connect the signage system. All they had access to was an external power cable, leading into the building.
To overcome this obstacle, LED Solutions needed to build a structure to hold the boards in place. They fabricated an aluminum skeleton, so the boards could be inserted and attached, then plugged into the power source. Afterwards, they daisy-chained a data cable from one board to the next. When all the boards were hooked up, the integration technician returned to sit down with the client, to get them networked and communicating with each other. Since there was no line of sight to the Wi-Fi antennas or the operations manager’s office, it was determined the best course of action was placing a subscriber identity module (SIM) card in the controller and using a 4G, cloud-based cellular network. With this technology, the screens could be changed from anywhere, inside or outside the building.
Once the screens were networked, the electrician completed the wiring and tested all the power loads. Then, the Electrical Safety Authority (ESA) performed an on-site inspection, to ensure and sign off that all the work was compliant. After both these steps were finished, it was time to close up the display.
One major factor for the team to consider when closing up the wall was ventilation. The boxes were only 127-mm deep, but the video boards were 152.4-mm (6-in.) deep. They would be slightly sticking out in the final product—which would not be an issue when the wall was closed up—but the back of each board would face the back of the wall. If they did not have the proper ventilation to breathe, they would certainly fail. Therefore, LED Solutions left a small gap and included air vents along the sides of the video boards. The left and right side of each board was clad with black, perforated metal for airflow, while the tops, bottoms, and remaining spaces were covered with matte black aluminum composite material (ACM).
Finally, with everything closed up, LED Solutions monitored the weather for rain, and checked in continuously with BPAC to make sure the installation was watertight. They credited the success of the project to assessing any potential issues and taking any challenges into consideration early on in the process. The screens have been successfully broadcasting the theatre’s coming attractions since June 2023.
The city’s affiliated sign shop later added vinyl details to the wall, including the box office number, website, and BPAC logo.
