Mini Trees that are built like Mega Trees

That seems to be a nice size. Honestly, the lower size was dictated by the base ring I found. I thought it would be a bit wider at the bottom but it worked out. It also ended up taller then I thought it would.
 
Wow, Bravo Bazmick, I didn't actually expect you to do a drawing of it, I gotta say with that topper and base, that would be the perfect, quick, solution to my design.

Of course though, a quick and easy solution, comes with a draw back, and that is the expense. But then, if I buy something, like that swivel chair base, that's gonna take hours to drill and modify to suit, and time is money.

BooY mentioned you could get away with a thinner material, that would reduce the cost wouldn't? And still provide the strength needed?
 
I could reduce the thickness on the top down to 3mm but the bottom part is pretty similar in size to a 48x or 64x topper but with less strings. My gut feeling is it would bend. I'll go and cut a section of the design above and put some stress on it.
 
Now to be honest i had already decided to do these a couple of days before @Brett Douglas posted this thread as i wanted to get away from my spiral trees
which have served me well till now. So have been doing some trial trees to find my ideal proportion and thought i would share them if it helps anyone in anyway. Both are same diameter, top 125mm and bottom 450mm . The shorter of the two is approx 1000mm and taller 1130mm.Build method is a bit rough but will be refined20220115_184425.jpg20220115_184835.jpg20220115_184926.jpgMINI TREES.jpg20220115_184314.jpg
 
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Ok I did one more smaller again . Base is 400mm (all i had handy ),top is still 125mm and the height is 850mm.
I think i'm liking the smaller one as i don't necessarily want them to stand out, but more be part of a cluster. Sorry not sure what's going on
with the rotation of the images

20220116_071801.jpg20220116_072803.jpg20220116_072920.jpg
 
How many strings and pixels/string are you looking at for the smaller one? Do you plan to elevate them off the ground at all? Is it particularly necessary to elevate trees like I've seen a lot of people do? I like the relative simplicity and availability of materials with this design. Considering doing a few small ones about the size of your smallest ones for my first dip into pixels. Looking forward to hearing how you like yours and any changes you might make for the future
 
Micro16 said:
How many strings and pixels/string are you looking at for the smaller one? Do you plan to elevate them off the ground at all? Is it particularly necessary to elevate trees like I've seen a lot of people do? I like the relative simplicity and availability of materials with this design. Considering doing a few small ones about the size of your smallest ones for my first dip into pixels. Looking forward to hearing how you like yours and any changes you might make for the future
Click to expand...
As for raising them up, each person has different reasons. Living in the Midwest snow is a concern for me so I raised my megatree but not my small spiral trees. Just finished my first show and when it snowed the lower part of the spiral tree was under snow so next year I will also work to elevate those up also. If there is not major concern I would not raise any of my props unless forced to.

Dean
 
Hi @Micro16 ,
Either 8 or 9 strands of 15 pixels so lets say 135 at the most plus i'm going to make some 20 node stars on top. My front yard is fairly sloped so I terrace my props as much as possible to prevent too much clutter. Poor photos but you get the picture20201218_141408.jpg20211231_224945.jpg
 
What is the underlying reason for elevating though? Is there concern for electrical reasons, other materials, or just that you want it entirely visible all the time, not hidden by snow? For elevating, one thought I've had is to basically invert a few short poles similar to the center pole and use them almost like stakes. Seem like a reasonable idea? Think you'd still need guy wires or that might provide enough support to hold them in place?

How do you have your topper held in place? Do you put the top up last, and how much tension do you aim for, just trying to eliminate sag and have straight lines? To what extent do you break these down after the season? I'm almost wondering if it were feasible and you had the space if simply reducing the tension and leaving the rest in place would be a good idea. Probably not the best use of space though.
 
Mine was mainly to get it above possible snow so that the lights would not be hidden. I can guess that since it is still early in winter we generally only have between 2 - 3 inches on average. Most of our snow doesn't show up until later Jan or early February. After the last snowfall earlier this week the the bottom most part of the spiral trees ended up covered. I capped all ends so was not too worried about moisture, just the lights showing up properly.
 
Brett Douglas said:
Hi Everyone,

My Mega Tree worked flawlessly this season, stable, strong and reliable, I was really pleased with how it held up. My 3 metre high Mega Tree followed the pattern of alot of others, trampoline base, centre pole, steel topper. I've seen the mini-trees available off-the-shelf, like the Dalek ones, though they don't have the density I want.

I'd like to build some Mini-Trees this season, something like the image below, and I think building it the same way, only smaller to my Mega Tree would be the way to go. First problem I've come across is no one makes toppers this small, and trampoline bases don't come this small either. I thought about 3D printing a topper out of ABS, but these toppers when tensioned with pixels strips have alot of load on them and I'm worried it'd snap.

Does anyone have any suggestions on toppers and base rings, preferably steel, for these sections?

View attachment 19463
Click to expand...
Going to make some with PvC sweeping bends.
 
Ran a quick sample late Friday arvo, also did a bend test on some 3mm plate and over 300mm it bent by about 5mm with out too much pressure applied.

2mm Sample Tree Base.jpg


Steel Bend 3mm.jpg

I'll try running some of the other material I was thinking about to see if I can get it to cut more consistently. It's worthwhile as it is $100/m2 cheaper than the steel.
 
Thanks for your efforts and the update BAZmick. Whats the other material called, perhaps Zinc-anneal?
 
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