Custom Made Microphone Stand That WILL NOT TIP!

I recently purchased a Heil PR781 microphone and Heil SB-2 boom to replace the hand-mic that came with the Flex3000.  I was getting tired of holding the microphone and not being able to type with both hands.  The boom comes with a substantial C-clamp that you can attach to the desk edge and the boom is allowed to pivot.  I installed the C-clamp on my old office desk but was only able to attach it just to the left of where my left wrist rests due to the rather narrow edge lip on the other potions of the desk.  I actually removed the pencil drawer on this desk to give my knees more room when I rock back on my desk chair so this also allowed  a place to attach the boom's C-clamp.

This worked fine but I found that my left arm movement was as a bit too cramped so I decided to buy a microphone stand to elevate the boom and to allow more arm movement.  So I purchased a DS-7 desk stand from Atlas Sound.

Atlas Sound DS-7 Desk Stand

 The issue with desk stand is that the despite the rather hefty cast-iron base, the entire things weights about 3 pounds.  The PR-781 and the microphone clip weight about 2 pounds and the boom obviously has some weight itself.  So you can imagine that this setup was very "tippy" due to the rather large amount of leverage being applied by the weight of the boom and microphone.  I tried to find a heavier base to use that would be sufficient but even floor bases are only about 9 pounds which I felt may not even be sufficient based on some calculations I made.

So, I had a local machine shop make me a custom base.  This machine shop has a water-jet cutter and they jetted out an 8" diameter piece of 1-1/2" think billet steel and I used the chrome portion of the stand above.  I used some sand-paper to cleanup the steel and then wiped it all down with generous amounts of rubbing alcohol to clean the surface before applying several coats of a hammer-finish paint.  The bottom is covered with some self-sticking black felt that I purchased from a local hobby/craft store.

Custom-Made 8" x 1-1/2" Billet Steel Base

Now at this point I need to add that this was probably overkill as the finished base and stand combined now weight 33 pounds which is plenty heavy!  I estimated that the weight would be more like 22 pounds.  But with the felt base it slides relatively easily on the desk when I need to adjust it.

Below is the overall view of the entire stand, boom, and microphone.  You can see that I can easily swing the boom right into place near when needed and I also have plenty of elbow room with the boom extended near its maximum.  Trust me, this setup is now rock-solid!  I am quite sure this would also easily support the large broadcasters boom and even the weight of a shock mount as well.

Finished Product