I will be honest, underneath my office desk is a hot mess. Wires everywhere and power strips piled up. I tried to push everything off to the sides, but it always migrates back to the center. I kick the stuff around and have switched off the power by accident before. Time to fix this pile.

I had an idea that trimming a set of wire shelves narrow would give me a good platform to hold up all the power strips and lots of spots to strap things down. This 4 foot shelf was only 10 dollars at lowes. It gives me a really great jumping off point. I started by taking off the longer rung section. This left me with a 6.5″ wide shelf.

From there I designed some brackets to go under my desk. They would strap down the shelf with zip ties, align with a shoulder to the desk’s back edge, and screw into the sides of the desk.

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The shelf fit check went well and I pulled my desk out to install the brackets. That is where things went a little south. I had measured, but not realized just how far away from the wall I would have to pull my desk to accommodate the shelf. The gap behind the table top was big enough to allow a lot of stuff to get tipped over and fall behind.

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I regrouped and cut off the next row from the wire shelving. That shortened it to a little over 4 inches which was a lot more manageable. I shortened up and reprinted the brackets. This let me retest the distance between the desktop and the wall. This size is going to work out.

With the bracket on I was able to slip the shelf into place and start wrangling wires. It took disconnecting everything and a lot of velcro, but I got it all organized and away from my feet. I don’t know how many places this kind of organization is useful. Certainly entertainment centers and computer stations, but beyond that I am not certain. I will have to keep this trick in my back pocket if I find myself with another big interconnected wire mess to straighten up. Brackets added to thingiverse by request. I only modeled one side, mirror in your slicer software to get the other side.