London's Royal Albert Hall is undergoing its first comprehensive building development since it opened in 1871. Scheduled to complete in 2003, the £66.3m programme originally began in 1995. AC Lighting's Special Projects division has completed the upgrade of part of the lighting cabling and control system at the venue. The RAH's deputy technical show manager, Mark Jones, designed and specified the system. AC has upgraded the circle rail with new power and control wiring for the front of house circuits. All existing trunking panels were replaced with customised 2m front panel sections, each containing 12 16Amp sockets for six dimming channels, along with two independent power circuits for moving lights and colour scrollers. 12 DMX connectors, covering two DMX 512 universes, were also installed around the circle rail for additional DMX fixtures. On stage, AC installed three six-way stage boxes, and continued the new DMX wiring with a series of outlets at ground level. These then extended out to FOH, where more ground-level DMX connection points were also installed. AC was assisted on site by Scott Nielson, the RAH's assistant technical show manager.
