Some of you may have seen the post about the stands i made about a month or so ago.
http://www.huntingnet.com/forum/tm.aspx?m=1684950&mpage=3&key=í¸±í²€

well i thought i was done making stands for the year but i got an itch and had to scratch it. Its 26' overall, 20' to the platform.

The first 10 feet I made completely solid from 1" 16 gauge (four 1" 11 gauge main legs) and its so rigid that if you really lean on it you will tip it before you sway it.
after putting the next 10' on it added a little sway but nothing like a store bought tripod.
the legs are 2" square 11 gauge with 1" sch40 pipe slipped inside and welded. This helps it mate to the 1" square top and adds a ton of strength to an already sturdy 2" 11 gauge. All in all it almost took a week to do but it could have been done in about 4 straight days.
It probably wont do much gun til gun season, but I pretty much own the field when the




http://www.photodump.org/stored8/tripod.jpg
http://www.photodump.org/stored8/tripod3.jpg
http://www.photodump.org/stored8/tripod4.jpg

The pics really dont do the field of view justice. but you get the idea

http://www.photodump.org/stored8/tripod7.jpg
http://www.photodump.org/stored8/tripod8.jpg
http://www.photodump.org/stored8/tripod9.jpg

very nice, what are you paying for metal, here it is crazy up/down

Very cool, but that has to be pretty dang heavy.

Nice garage!

1" 16ga is going for $.69 and 11 gauge is going for $.89 a foot.

the 2" a nd sch40 pipe I already had laying around. I was going to use 1.5" 3/16" wall but that came out to $2.50 a foot

All in all she weighs between 400-500lbs. but its worth to not sway like a mamosa when a 10mph wind picks up.

I don't know if I would feel safe getting up in that thing here in Texas. The wind get blowing pretty hard here, and that thing would fall over really quick. How do you secure it?

its chained and turnbuckled to fencepost at all 3 corners, I am thinking about putting a stand off against the tree as well but really the fence post should be enough.

Very nice job. Well done...

It looks very nice. How much would you expect a similiar stand made of aluminum to cost to make?

roughyl twice as much.

I have ~$300 in materials in this one. youd definately want the aluminum tig welded or else murphy may bite your arse.

tom