Hello,

How many tiers can I stack and only rely on dowels and cake plates to prevent the upper tier to crash into the lower tier ? And by the way, do you prefer wood or plastic dowels ?

When do I need more structure and what kind of structure would I need then ?

Thanks a lot in advance

I don't know how many you can stack, but, read this post to learn all about the sps.

http://cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-603925.html

I use bubble tea straws and stack as many tiers as I need to. The tallest I've done is 5 tiers, but I never use any other supports in any cake I do. Usually, I don't even do a central dowel.

http://cakecentral.com/gallery/53839
This is a cake I made with 6 tiers supported with plastic drink straws. I got them from BurgerKing I took a big handful and asked the mgr 'how much?' and she let me have them w/o paying anything.
If you are not comfortable using straws then get the hollow plastic dowels rods.
Some people have used straws, then put a wooden dowel rod into the straw for extra support without getting the wood taste that dowels leave in the cake.

jammjenks - I've used bubbletea straws as well, but used foamboard and cake boards on top of them - are you saying this is not necessary? Thanks in advance for the info!

There's no reason to ever use dowels or straws without a board under the tier/layer above. The dowels/straws wouldnt be supporting anything otherwise.

Ive done as many as three layers before adding support. I think the rule of thumb is support for every 6" of cake. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong. I use bubble straws and they work very well. I would say if you are going to stack layers, use support every 6". If you are stacking tiers, support every tier no matter how high. As for how high the total cake before using another means of support, Ive never gone that high. I would check into SPS for that. I havent used it myself but plan to when I make my first wedding cake in Oct.

Just wonderful information everyone! I could not wrap my head around using just the straws or dowels without any board being used in between for the next layer or tier.

Now how/when is a long dowel used for support down the center of a cake? and what is SPS? It is so obvious that I am a newbie, huh?!

Thank you everybody, all the help and info is very much appreciated!

Wow. Thanks a lot you guys. BubleTea Straws ... Love this !

If you follow the SPS link provided above, them go to page 15 of the sticky you'll find the tutorial.

Ok, it took a while to get to pg 15 for the SPS (single plate system), which was well worth getting to. Thank you so very much for that link! It is very thorough and informative!