Can you help figure this out? 8, 10 and 12 are real cake. 14" will be a cake dummy.

I have been using SPS so no center dowel. How does this work with the cake dummy? I assume I don't need to try to force the SPS legs through the dummy but if I don't how does it stay attached and support the rest of the real cake?

Thanks!

The 12" will sit directly on the dummy - no support of any kind is needed. The 14" dummy is going to be iced exactly as the rest of the cake. The 12" cake is on a 12" board that will sit directly on top of the 14". The icing will hold it in place. Really, it won't come apart If it would make you feel better you can use a long dowel down thru all the tiers to help hold it together. So if each tier is 4" tall that center dowel should be about 16-18" long. It doesn't need to go all the way thru the 14"er - just a couple of inches will do it. You want to leave it a couple of inches above the top tier so you can get a hold of it and pull it out once the cake is set up.

With the SPS system you can't use a center dowel. That's why I was wanting to know if it would stay without any center dowel. I need to drive it about 1/2 hour with all 4 tiers assembled so I need to know that the bottom dummy tier isn't going anywhere.

Thanks for your reply.

Think of the 14" dummy cake as your cake display base, it just happens to be decorated like the cake.

Yeah what she ^^^^^ said Often, a center rod is not that much help.....false hope
Having the cake finished the night before delivery so the icing has time to set up is really all you need to hold it in place

ditto.