I was in the city this Saturday on canal street and I saw a plastics store and decided to check it out. I had wanted to build something like this but never found myself in store like this before. I bought 1 36" x 1/4"acrylic rod. And two different sized discs. The acrylic cost me $15. Then some screws washers and nuts. And soft bumpers for the tips. So it's roughly 13 inches from the base to the tips.