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Ideas for vesa mount on unique glass table - possibly clamp on leg?

armaneo

I have a bit of a different glass desk that has some potential for clamping a vesa mount. The entire frame of the desk (pictured below) is composed of 2" x 2" stainless steel, with a single plate of glass sitting on stand-offs about 1/8" above the steel frame.  I'm wondering if I can use some kind of metal clamp, where the top of the clamp would slide between the glass and metal.  Some possibly ill-conceived ideas for such clamps appear appear.  Otherwise, is there any way I could clamp something onto one of the legs?  I couldn't find anything like that.

 

Desk in question:

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Possible clamps:

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After some semi-extensive googling, it sort of looks like your stuck with a standard "legged" VESA stand sitting on top of the desk... the alternative would require some fabrication.

 

If you bought a standard clamp stile stand, then flipped the clamp backwards and fabricated a custom braket for the clamping mechanism to press against, then the arm would clear the back or side of the desk and you could attach the clamp to one of your desk legs.

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I concur about the “no simple solutions” here.  


The “thin clamp between the metal and glass” thing founds like a bad idea because 

A there isn’t enough room

B those clear beads holding the glass off the metal are soft shock mounts.  They’re going to need to compress.  If you put a clamp in there the chances the glass will just break across the clamp are not low.

 

the problem with “clamp it to a leg” is one leg is full of power ports so you’d have to clamp it to the other leg, and either way the mount will be on the far corner of the desk which sucks and it would be off set weight wise so you’d have tippyness issues.

 

fabrication or on-desk seem to be the only ways out. You can’t even drill a hole in the glass because tempered glass can not be cut.

 

a standard desk stand is likely the best option.  Everything else is last resort.


In the last resort situation My personal move would probably be to drill a hole in the desk and stand front to back where I wanted the mount to be and bolt to that.  You’d need multiple bolts to keep it from just tipping over sideways.  Sounds like a mess.  Welding is probably even worse.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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45 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

In the last resort situation My personal move would probably be to drill a hole in the desk and stand front to back where I wanted the mount to be and bolt to that.  You’d need multiple bolts to keep it from just tipping over sideways.  Sounds like a mess.  Welding is probably even worse.

Not 100% sure I follow... but...

 

Using a clamp style mount then, throwing away the clamp portion, and just run 2-3 bolts through the rear horizontal support frame bar(front to back for example). Might secure the monitor mount sufficiently. I'd put a rubber pad between the top of the mount and the glass surface, but this would move all the weight support to the bolts that are running parallel to the plane of the glass through the support frame bar.

 

This may have been what you are suggesting, but not sure.

 

Edit:

On second thought though... if the frame is aluminum, it may be too weak to support the mount this way... depends on how thick the desk frame is, how many bolts you can fit in the mount, and how heavy your monitor setup is... if the desk is steal though, this should work great.

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2 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

My personal move would probably be to drill a hole in the desk and stand front to back where I wanted the mount to be and bolt to that.  You’d need multiple bolts to keep it from just tipping over sideways.  Sounds like a mess.  Welding is probably even worse.

1 hour ago, AaronThomas said:

Not 100% sure I follow... but...

 

Using a clamp style mount then, throwing away the clamp portion, and just run 2-3 bolts through the rear horizontal support frame bar(front to back for example). Might secure the monitor mount sufficiently. I'd put a rubber pad between the top of the mount and the glass surface, but this would move all the weight support to the bolts that are running parallel to the plane of the glass through the support frame bar.

 

This may have been what you are suggesting, but not sure.

 

Edit:

On second thought though... if the frame is aluminum, it may be too weak to support the mount this way... depends on how thick the desk frame is, how many bolts you can fit in the mount, and how heavy your monitor setup is... if the desk is steal though, this should work great.

Thanks guys. This actually sounds like the best idea here. Pictured below is a random vesa mount I found on Amazon. I could just remove the bottom bracket that has the thumb screw, and just bolt the vertical piece directly onto one of the horizontal beams of the desk (confirmed that desk is made from heavy stainless steel).  My only concern is that the weight of the monitor (34" ultrawide) would cause the horizontal part of the bracket that is connected to the main rod to dip down and put pressure on the glass.  I could put felt or rubber underneath it, but the pressure might still cause the glass to crack.

 

Alternatively, I could keep the lower bracket (with thumb screw), flip it around 180 degrees, and bolt it into the table such that the vertical rod is hovering off the desk.  Then I could stuff a small block of wood into the bracket and tighten with the thumbscrew, effectively removing all pressure points from the glass.  

 

Edit: I guess one (major) problem is that the entire frame has electrical cables running through it (there are power plugs in 7 different locations).  Maybe this is too much work.

 

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@armaneo Be careful though, something that claps on to the bar and the glass may end up cracking or scratching the glass.

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12 minutes ago, armaneo said:

Thanks guys. This actually sounds like the best idea here. Pictured below is a random vesa mount I found on Amazon. I could just remove the bottom bracket that has the thumb screw, and just bolt the vertical piece directly onto one of the horizontal beams of the desk (confirmed that desk is made from really heavy stainless steel).  My only concern is that the weight of the monitor (34" ultrawide) would cause the horizontal part of the bracket that is connected to the main rod would start to dip down and put pressure on the glass.  I could put some felt or rubber underneath it, but the pressure might still cause the glass to crack.

 

Alternatively, I could keep the lower bracket (with thumbscrews), flip it around 180 degrees and bolt it into the table such that the vertical rod is hovering off the desk.  Then I could stuff some small block of wood into the bracket and tighten with the thumbscrew, effectively removing all pressure points from the glass.  

 

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Toss the bottom of the bracket, flip the thing backwards so the L is facing away from the glass.  There appear to be 3 holes in the bracket in a staggered pattern.  Use all 3.  Get bolts that fit in them and use the bracket as a guide to drill 3 holes through the horizontal support beam. Bolt through that.  No glass in the way.  Might not work because of the direction facing of the mount.  I don’t know how the top bit works. It would possibly have tippyness problems because it moves the CG of the mount behind the table legs.  Glass is heavy though.

 

the other option would be to mount it facing forward the same way.  You’d have to mount much lower on the bracket.  Enough so you leave enough space between the top of the desk beam and the glass that they wouldn’t touch.  That looks like 1/8th in. steel though.  I doubt it would bend much.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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3 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

Toss the bottom of the bracket, flip the thing backwards so the L is facing away from the glass.  There appear to be 3 holes in the bracket in a staggered pattern.  Use all 3.  Get bolts that fit in them and use the bracket as a guide to drill 3 holes through the horizontal support beam. Bolt through that.  No glass in the way.  Might not work because of the direction facing of the mount.  I don’t know how the top bit works. It would possibly have tippyness problems because it moves the CG of the mount behind the table legs.  Glass is heavy though.

 

the other option would be to mount it facing forward the same way.  You’d have to mount much lower on the bracket.  Enough so you leave enough space between the top of the desk beam and the glass that they wouldn’t touch.  That looks like 1/8th in. steel though.  I doubt it would bend much.

Yeah, my concern with flipping it and mounting with the L hanging off is that, maybe these mounts are designed to offload the principal weight of the monitor+stand vertically onto the table's surface.  I'm concerned the L might start to bend or even just break if it's just hovering out there.

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5 minutes ago, armaneo said:

Yeah, my concern with flipping it and mounting with the L hanging off is that, maybe these mounts are designed to offload the principal weight of the monitor+stand vertically onto the table's surface.  I'm concerned the L might start to bend or even just break if it's just hovering out there.

Ok.  So get long bolts and also drill through and mount a block of something to support the L bracket.  Effectively extend the entire table backwards the width and length of the space under the bracket.  Might need some shims between the block and the bottom of the Lbracket to make sure it was tight tight.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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Get a mount you can attach to the wall?

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i7 4790k · 32GB Kingston HyperX · MSI Gaming 5 · ... · 30" HP ZR30W + 27" Samsung 275T · 2x240GB Intel 530 in Raid 0 + 2x1TB Crucial MX500 · Lain-Li X2000F · Antec Signature SG-850 · BeQuiet! Dark Rock 3 Pro · Logitech Z5500 · Win10pro 64bit

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19 hours ago, IcarusLSC said:

Get a mount you can attach to the wall?

Wish I could, but the desk is in the middle of the room.

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It appears the glass top is sitting on small rubber bumpers.  Try placing some metal plates of equal thickness to the bumpers between the glass and the metal frame where the stand will be located.  That will prevent the clamp from squeezing the glass and steel frame together, relieving the desk of unnecessary stress.

 

A metal reinforcement plate can also be used to help spread the clamp base out so it isn't focused as much on one point of the desk.

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On 2/24/2020 at 11:13 AM, armaneo said:

Wish I could, but the desk is in the middle of the room.

Drop mount from the ceiling?

·Ï¢årµ§·

i7 4790k · 32GB Kingston HyperX · MSI Gaming 5 · ... · 30" HP ZR30W + 27" Samsung 275T · 2x240GB Intel 530 in Raid 0 + 2x1TB Crucial MX500 · Lain-Li X2000F · Antec Signature SG-850 · BeQuiet! Dark Rock 3 Pro · Logitech Z5500 · Win10pro 64bit

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