Many of you will already know that whilst there are several manufacturers out there, there tends to be one UK manufacturer who excels in three key practical terms;
Firstly stability of their stands themselves
Secondly; being a UK based company they can customize your stand in certain ways at time of order.
Thirdly; you can quickly buy any additional/spare parts you want, in any quantity. Lost one of those little handwheel bolt thingies?, dented a chrome pole while persuading Aunty Ethel that she should find someone else to gum during “Unchained Melody”?. Don’t want to buy a pack of 8, when you only need 1…no problem.
You’d be forgiven for thinking that this companies logo was a flowing red cape and blue lycra body suit by now… the company is Ultimate, and the stand in this particular review is their recently launched:
ULTIMAX PROFESSIONAL DJ STAND WITH WIND UP RIG & WHEELED BASE.
OK, not the catchiest of names, but as stands go, it’s several very large steps ahead of any other all-in-one stand. Perhaps “The Ultimax Winch’n’Wheel stand” would be a good marketing title.
The basic stand can be ordered in one of three widths to cater for pretty much any amount of equipment you care to place on it. My stand is 1700mm (internal) wide, for those of you that know my audio system, you’ll know why I went for the widest one. For those with less gear, a 1600mm and a 1200mm width stand are also available.
With a load rating of 80kg for the overhead rig, it will easily handle 99% of mobile shows with ease. How much is 80kg? Well, for comparison, 10 x Abstract Twister 3’s (@ 7.6kg each) would weigh 76kgs, 10 NJD Datamoons @ 8kg’s each would be just on the limit, alternatively, 53 x Par64 spotlights grab you? OK, they’d never fit on a 3 meter wide rig (extendable with extra length pieces), and you’d need several 13amp wall sockets to run them, but you get the idea. Another way of looking at it, is that 80kg’s is 12 and a half stone – you could hang your roadie, or a small heckler up to dry.
What is impressive already is that the width of the stand is dictated by the front and back crosspieces. If you start off with say the 1200mm crosspieces, and find that all your new audio gear and lighting controllers wont fit, you don’t need to buy a whole new stand, simply get two new longer crosspieces. Even a pair of the longest crosspieces wont even set you back £44 (+P&P). You could even keep the shorter pieces for those times when “the band” have hogged all the stage and left you that “cosy” 5ft gap between the Jukebox and the Fruit Machine.
Each Crosspiece offers two top rails and two lower rails. Typically the top rails would be where your CD-decks, mixer and ol’ Technics go, and are typically 915mm high from the ground. The lower rails are normally 635mm off the ground, and ideal for amplifiers, lighting controllers, power packs, and those all important Tupperware tubs to collect the buffet left-overs in for the van ride home at 3am.
At either end of the two crosspieces are 2 threaded bars which go through corresponding holes of the upright “End pieces”. Now here’s another example of how Ultimates UK locality rule the roost. If requested, you can have additional holes drilled in the end pieces, allowing you to mount the crosspieces at a different height. Ideal if you use a tall 8,4,4 system case for some gigs, but a low slim-line laptop other weeks, or of course, if you’re simply an 8ft wookie, or a prefer to laptop DJ from the comfort of your chair.
The end pieces are home to the removable UK built winch pods which effortlessly allow you to winch the 3metre wide double bar, from its minimum height of 1720mm (67.7 inches or about 5 and a half feet) right up to a maximum height of 3 metres (approx 10ft high) or any height in-between, with a reassuring clink, clink, clink of the safety rachets as you turn the handle. The ease of turning the handle magically doesn’t seem difficult regardless of how much weight is being lifted – that’s either clever engineering, or I’d had 3 Shredded Wheat that morning.
Once at your chosen height, two things besides the rachet mechanism itself keep the bar and all your lighting (which you were able to wire up safely with both your feet on the floor); at that height. Firstly a flattened thumbscrew mounted on the front of each winch pod, and secondly a clever pole mounted collar with a spring loaded pin which springs into any of the pre-drilled holes along the length of the upright chrome poles. If some drunken Tracy comes along and spins the main winch handle around a few times while trying to ‘ang ‘er ‘andbag on it, the overhead bar wont budge an inch, preventing your DMX scanners from interfacing “the hard way” with you mixer… or your head for that matter.
As if the above safety features weren’t enough, theres still one more great piece of ingenuity still to come with regards to the winch pods…they turn. Yes, of course they turn, I hear you say…you’d never be able to winch’em up if they didn’t turn. Quite right. What I mean however is that the end pieces have another flattened thumbscrew which, when loosened, allows you to safely rotate the entire upright pole AND winch pod from the inside edge of the stand (eg: facing into your mixer) to the outside edge of the stand (eg: so the winchpods are out of your way for the rest of the night). This is a practical marvel. With the winchpods turned inwards, facing each other you can reach both handles and wind them up simultaneously, which saves all that messing about with “3 turns of the left handle, run to the other side, 3 turns of the right handle” dance routine.
When the overhead bar is at the right height, turn the winchpods outwards and tighten the thumbscrews.
The overhead bar, which is a double bar to totally prevent sagging in the middle, mounts onto the two upright chrome poles. Flattened thumbscrews keep the bar in place and a captive nut/bolt which passes through the upright poles arrests any chance of the double bar from sliding down the pole, regardless of the number of effects attached above.
For those satisfied customers, upgrading from existing Ultimax stands there is one cautionary note. The chrome poles and winchpod assemblies have a wider diameter than used on previous stands. The wide range of pan/tilt shelves for 19inch kit, such as mixers, lighting controllers etc, all use either the Ultimax Open Casting, or Closed Casting clamps. These clamps will not over/around the Winchpod or poles. However, Ultimax were happy to attach an additional set of smaller (original) pole mounts just infront of the winchpods for me, allowing me to use all my existing accessory shelves, lighting controller pan/tilt brackets etc. Great UK service!
Think that’s all. Well, or rather “Wheel” it isn’t. The end pieces bolt into Wheel bases, providing the stand with 4 extremely sturdy castors. These allow the stand and a great deal of its contents, to be moved almost effortlessly from one room to another.
The usefulness of this is worthy of an example: In one of my wedding venues, they have the evening function (me) in the same room as the afternoon reception and meal. This used to mean that I would arrive early move all of my loose gear and boxes into a side room across the corridor from the main function room and wait, and wait and wait, listening to the 3 or 4 muted applauses which meant that each of the speeches and presentations were finally underway. At which point, an cartoon-like total panic ensued as all the guests pile out of the room at 6:50pm, some still expecting a 7:15 start … ho…ho…ho,no! Since I got the Ultimax “winch’n’wheel” stand (I ought to copyright that name now I think © ) things have been a little different.
I take all of my gear into the side room as before, assemble the stand on its wheels, hang all the overhead lighting, wire up the power to the lights, the DMX cables, the non-DMX sync-link cables, the slave pack 9pin lead etc, tidy the whole birds nest of cables using Velcro (I cant pre-wire this lot, I change the lighting too much), place the systems case on the top shelf, lighting controllers on the lower shelf and…go and have a coffee…
Once the crowds migrated to the bar, I simply roll the whole stand (with overhead bar winched down low enough to miss the doorframes) into the function room and winch it back up to the ceiling. Doddle! Add a few items which don’t live on the stand eg: Speakers, my rolling Amp flightcase, light screens etc, and I’m now up & running before the venue staff have finished swapping the table cloths and picking crushed sugared almonds out of the carpet.
The only thing which I would say is not ideal about the wheel base (which is available separately by the way, for those of your with earlier Ultimate stands) is the brakes, which lock the casters in-place, once you’ve wheeled your show into position. Like many brakes found on heavy-duty (as opposed to extremely heavy-duty) casters, the brakes are a simple flip down to lock, flip up to unlock. Heres the snag. With the brakes up (unlocked) for rolling, the extreme tip of the brake is slightly higher than the lowest metal part on the underside of the wheel base. This means that if you turned your stand around in a figure of eight, the caster cant turn a full 360degrees. One of two things happen as the brake meets the underside of the wheel base. Either the brake is pushed down into its locked position, or the brake unclips and falls off (but simply clips back firmly into place. Solution?: Take all four brake levels off, and keep them in your pocket until the show is wheeled into place, then clip them into postition. Once in place, the brakes perform admirably; Result!
The end of the night, and the dreaded packing away holds a couple of other nice surprises. Firstly, the ease at which the overhead bar comes down – and no, I don’t mean it obeys gravity and drops like a guillotine.
The first time I used my Winch’n’wheel stand, I got to the end of the gig, held onto the main handle for dear life, got someone else to do the same at the other end, slid the spring-ring collar round to one side, and carefully undid the flatten thumbscrew at the front of the winchpod. I performed all these actions with the caution of a man taking the last plastic pick-axe off of a “Buck-a-roo” game. I braced myself, prepared myself to take the strain, and started turning the handle, expecting the full weight of the overhead bar to suddenly rip the handle out of my hand and send it into a Hotpoint Spin Cycle… what actually happened was that the handle only turned as I moved it, allowing a perfectly safe and smooth lowering of the overhead bar. Impressive.
Thanks again to the wheels, you could easily save yourself some pack-up time (and therefore lengthen the amount of sleep you get later) by wheeling the whole rig to the fire exits, which are invariably at the far end of the the venue in one go. For venues where the caretaker looks as happy as "Ol' Janitor Jones" you could even wheel the rig straight out of the venue and off-load the overhead bar in one piece, straight into the van. This means you're out of "his" venue quicker , and also offers the benefit that nearly all your gear is in one place, so less likely to go "walkies" in some situations...("I swear I left that other Twister 4 over there on that bass bin...")
The other nice DJ-friendly aspect of the stand is that each of the end pieces, with the winchpods and wheelbases still attached are perfectly balanced for being carried back to the van/trailer. They are reassuringly heavy, but thanks to them being so well balanced, most people will be able to carry one end piece, fully assembled, in each hand.
Being a winch stand, it comes under health and safety regulations, and to keep you and your customers legal, every stand is supplied with the relevant handbook.
Aimed at the more professional end of the market, or to anyone who just wants to make life easier (and who doesn't), it certainly isn't the cheapest stand on the market but then with prices ranging from £428 to £440 depending on the stand width you’re looking at investing only 2 or 3 gigs worth of earnings, for something which will make life easier at every gig.
Overall, this is an extremely well-built stand and is a crowning tribute to its UK manufacturers both in its physical stability and the associated pre and post-sales service. Worth every penny!
