Fixtra

Tube Gross Length Calculator

From your XYZ bend points and tooling lengths, get the gross cut length — with and without boost — and flag any straight between two bends that is shorter than the clamp die, resolving it with compound tooling or a cut-weld allowance. Bend geometry uses the same math as the XYZ → YBC converter.

1 Bend points & radius

Pt	X mm	Y mm	Z mm

Intersection points, in order. First and last rows are the free ends; the rows between are the bends. Paste from a spreadsheet works too.

CLR (centreline radius) mm

2 Tooling lengths

Tube OD mm (reference only)

Clamp die length mm

Pressure die length mm

Wiper length mm

Collet insertion mm

Safety distance mm

Parts nested on one tube

Min grippable straight = clamp die length. Boost gross uses pressure die + safety + collet; no-boost uses wiper + safety + collet. Nesting N parts shares the grip end and adds one clamp length per inner join.

How it works. Straights are measured tangent-to-tangent (true grippable length after each bend's setback T = CLR·tan(C/2)). A straight between two bends shorter than the clamp die is flagged: fix it with compound tooling (adds no length) or a cut-weld (clamp − straight, adds a weld joint). Nesting: running N identical parts on one tube pays the front-end grip allowance once and adds one clamp length per inner join (N−1 joins), so total = N·(base + cut-weld) + (N−1)·clamp + front-end allowance and gross-per-part falls as N rises. Springback and material stretch are not applied — add those from your own test bends.