On 02/23/2010 02:08 PM, Ed Lowenstein wrote:
I've done a lot of 3 inch thick shelves whre I could fabricate a cleat
screwed into studs and slip the shelf over the cleat. Now the shelf is
a 7/8 inch thick 5 foot slab of Sapele.. maybe 5 inches deep. Can I
make a cleat or does somebody make one I can use for this
application?? I would think I need metal here. Thanks much

Others have mentioned the blind supports from LV. They're supposed to
be for 1" thick shelves though, so the metal plate might be visible in
your case.

One other option would be to counterbore part way through the width of
the shelf at each stud, with a clearance hole the rest of the way
through from the other side, and then put a long lag screw into each
stud. You could then either plug the holes or laminate a strip along
the front edge to cover them up.

Chris