Tree stand eye bolts not long enough for smaller Christmass trees? Fix?

[Don2222]

Does anyone have any other ideas on this?
We have a real Xmass tree stand and this year our tree had a skinny base so when the eye bolts are tightened all the way they still do not touch the tree! As a temporary solution I cut small pieces of synthetic wood to put against the tree and tighten the 3 eye bolts to hold it. This is a very awkward solution because one person has to hold the tree straight and one person has to hold the wood while another person tightens the eye bolts! It did work but this is what I was thinking.
Make a small tree eye bolt extension.
Get some threaded rod the same size. On one end just barely thread a nut on it and weld it in place. Cut rod to an appropriate length. On the other end drill a hole through the synthetic wood for the threaded red and then drill a larger whole enough to recess a nut to hold the wood onto the rod. Make 3 for all 3 tree stand eye bolts. Then small and larger trees can be used for the same stand?
Actually it could be simpler with a flared flange nut welded to the tree side and with a regular nut welded on the extension side?

 

[all night moe]

Just get 3 bolts of desired length. Use a socket and ratchet.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Put tape around the base of the tree to make it the desired thickness.

 

[all night moe]

Put tape around the base of the tree to make it the desired thickness.

Might become a lot of tape. LOL

 

[EatenByLimestone]

That certainly could be the case!

 

[Don2222]

I just found a fix for the tree stand so I do not have to put pieces of wood 🪵 in for smaller base Xmass trees! The eye bolts that come with the tree stand are 6” long and are 5/16”-18 course threads. So for $1.99 each at Ace Hardware I found J-Bolts that are 7” long 5/16”-18 course threads! As you can see in the 1st picture below that 4 of them will almost touch each other! That will work with any size tree! See pics 1 & 2

However there is one big problem The new eye bolts do not have threads going back to the eye hook! They are about 2” short so they will not screw into the tree stand all the way
See pic 3 & 4

Looks like the best thing to do is a Rapid Tap to extend the threads !!
So I pulled out the Harbor Freight trusty Tap & Die Set and did a Rapid Tap to extend the treads all the way back to the J hook!! The J bolts came with 5/16 nuts that lock in the 5/16” flange nuts at the end for a larger contact area for better support!
$1.99 each for the J-Bolts and $0.59 for each flange nut. See pics 5-9
Total cost $10.32