building shelf with questions..

typo

just fyi i am far from handy when it comes to building things, so i attempted to build a shelf out of 3/4 wood and used a friends nail gun with 3 inch finishing nails the shelf is fine. I believe it to be a tad heavy but i am sure it will work but the self is 4 inches thick which is too thick for my eyes to bare. The shelf is going to be mounted to studs ( 3 to be exact) and will need to bare around 20 lbs and need to be about 36 inches long and 13 inches deep to hold my cable box and blu ray player. I am going to take another stab at this and try to frame shelf out of 2x2 and skin it with 1/4 wood that looks nice so i wont have to stain it and use 2x2 for the Bracket/wall support.(floating shelf)

any ideas or input before i attempt to build this?

Ron6519

I don't know why you built it that thick. A simple 3/4" shelf would carry the items you listed.
You don't mention the supports you're using. If it's simple brackets, you're over building. If you want a decorative edge, you can simply add molding, in whatever thickness appeals to you.
Ron

pyper

Yeah, just get a 1x12 and screw your brackets to the joists.