Many tripods come with eyepiece shelves which are too large to fit together with the tripod or are too cumbersome to fight with during the night. I prefer to replace such shelves with self-contained brackets attached permanently to the tripod and easily locked with large knob. However, to date I had to place my eyepieces on such brackets which were not the most secure place. A simple yet very useful idea stroked me during last observing session - an "add-on" eyepiece shelf. The added benefit is that I can also fit on the shelf my 5" TFT monitor, which I use in the field while DSLR imaging with my Canon 40D - it is larger than the camera display and most importantly can be oriented facing upwards, which is much more convenient than looking at the camera display facing the ground.

My eyepiece shelf is made of two pieces of 8mm (1/3") plywood. Larger piece is ca 20 x 14cm and has 2 slots for 2" eyepieces and 3 for 1.25" ones. There is a piece of wood attached below at the edge, beveled at 30 degrees (the angle was selected somehow arbitrary and the shelf itself is not really horizontal, but this also depends on which tripod it is attached). The smaller piece is 14 x 8cm - these dimension were chosen in order to fit various tripods (later about that). Both pieces are connected by an 8cm long hinge. Hinge is positioned in such a way that - while open - the larger piece and a dovel underneath is pressing towards the smaller piece, thus keeping the shelf horizontal. I used only 6 x 3mm wood screws to attach hinge but experimenting showed that the shelf easily keeps 2 - 3 heavy eyepieces like Pentax XL or Meade UWA. I do not own Nagler 31mm so cannot comment.

There is another small dovel 2x3cm, 8cm long with an M6x80 machine screw attached. This long screw passes through a hole in the smaller plywood plate. Dovel and plate are tightened against the tripod leg using an M6 wing nut. Actually, while using a collapsible tripod, the screw simply rests on the middle section of the leg and the nut need to be tightened only enough to keep the shelf in proper orientation.

The whole shelf attaches and detaches in few seconds and can be stored in accessory box or together with mount head.

I have tested the shelf with a couple of my tripods, including small aluminium one which come with CG-5 mount and is now used with P2Z, Takahashi collapsible tripod for EM-10/11 mounts and a large Baader hardwood tripod used for Mach-1 mount. In all cases it fits perfectly and keeps eyepiece secure but handy.

Total project time ca 8 hours spanning over 2 weeks needed for the water resistant lacquer to dry and harden properly.

If I was doing this next time, I would probably use 10mm thick plywood, but only due to the fact that it is much easier to find 10mm wood screws than 8mm :-)