Nautilus Theater
Reprinted from Birket Engineering News, March/April 1994

Sea World of Florida’s Nautilus Theatre renovation features a rigging control system by Birket Engineering. The upgraded theater provided the Orlando park with facilities for shows not possible at other Sea World locations. The open air theater was enclosed to contain technical capabilities previously unavailable, including lighting effects, water and pyrotechnic effects, and rigging for collapsing scenery and an eighty-foot proscenium opening.

Theater rigging necessary for the new facility was provided by J.R. Clancy, Inc. Clancy was responsible for the fifteen variable speed 7.5 HP line shaft systems for moving the set pieces and scenery, as well as the 10 HP contour curtain system. Each set piece has over 40 feet of travel.

Birket Engineering contracted to J.R. Clancy to provide the rigging control system for the theater. The Birket system allows for very accurate and fast absolute positioning of the sixteen winch systems through both a Windows™ PC system and a handheld controller. Rigging events are synchronized with show events using SMPTE time code.

An IBM compatible PC is the primary operator interface for the system. Windows™ based Birket software provides an intuitively easy programming environment for setting up and executing rigging cues. A 4-line by 20-character handheld controller is also provided as a secondary operator interface for on-stage control.

The winches are controlled by variable frequency drives. These drives are controlled by an Allen-Bradley SLC-5/03 Small Logic Controller that receives direction from the PC. The SLC contains four analog input modules and four analog output modules. The input modules read absolute position information provided by Celesco 4-20ma potentiometric transducers. Because the position signal is absolute, no homing sequence is necessary in the event of a power loss. The system provides fault monitoring of the drives and system status messages on the large Super VGA screen.

The rigging control system communicates with the show system through an Alcorn-McBride V16 Show Controller, which coordinates the show’s SMPTE code sequence with the rigging system’s PC. This provides a means of triggering rigging cues based upon SMPTE time from the master show control system for lighting and audio.