Axient Wireless Mics Provide Interference-free Operation For Trackside Reporting Team

To bring visitors to the Spa  Francorchamps race track even closer to the action, a mobile reporting  crew covers all the goings-on in the pit lane and the team workshops.  The reporters use wireless microphones to interview the drivers and  their crews, bringing interesting facts and inside info to the watching  spectators live. However, the racing teams’ tech support crew and the  many live TV news-gathering teams active at the Spa Francorchamps site  at any time also use wireless systems extensively, making it a very  active environment in RF terms. The area they have to cover is also  several hundred metres long and covered with steel structures, which is  always a challenge for wireless microphones. Running the wireless mics  without interference of one kind or another is very difficult.

Belgian audio integrator for the Francorchamps Circuit, FACE, chose  Shure’s flagship Axient wireless system, in combination with Wisycom  antennas, for the reporting team’s microphones.

According to Glenn Willems, Account Manager at FACE, Axient has  operated flawlessly at Spa Francorchamps since installation. "The  excellent intermodulation behaviour of the Axient transmitters and  receivers, in combination with the bullet-proof Wisycom amps, ensure  that interference due to overload, adjacent channel transmitters and  intermodulation products can be avoided. When we tested the system in  this critical environment, it turned out that even on the edges of the  requested coverage area, we were able to obtain more than 25 dB of  fading margin using a clever antenna configuration. Additionally, the  Axient systems allow us to program any frequencies that are reserved —  for example for television or radio coverage — which are then  automatically excluded."