Conduit bending cheat sheet

A conduit bending cheat sheet is only useful if the numbers on it match the shoe in your truck. The multipliers above are the cosecants electricians have used for decades: 5.76 at 10°, 3.86 at 15°, 2.61 at 22.5°, 2.00 at 30°, 1.41 at 45°, and 1.15 at 60°. Shrink rides alongside — 1/16, 1/8, 3/16, 1/4, 3/8, and 1/2 inch of lost run for every inch of offset height. WattsCalc uses those Klein figures and nothing else.

On the stick, an offset is two identical bends in opposite directions. You pick an angle that fits the room. Thirty degrees is the shop default because the math is easy and the pipe still looks clean. Forty-five degrees saves length in a tight stud bay but eats more shrink and is harder to keep parallel. Ten and fifteen degrees are for long, shallow kicks where a sharp dog-leg would show on a finished wall.

Measure the offset height from centerline to centerline, not from the edge of a box to a guess. Multiply that height by the multiplier. That product is the distance between the two marks. Example you can check in the calculator: 6 inches at 30° is 12 inches on the pipe. Mark the first bend, measure that distance, mark the second, and rotate the conduit 180° between bends so the offset stays in one plane.

Shrink is a separate number. The conduit travels farther through the dog-leg than a straight run of the same box-to-box distance. If you cut to the tape on the wall and ignore shrink, the far connector will be short. Add shrink to the developed length before you cut. The companion conduit shrink chart walks through why that shortness shows up and how much to add at each angle.

Ninety-degree stub-ups use take-up, not a multiplier. Take-up is the distance from the bender arrow to the back of the 90. Subtract it from the finished stub height and put that mark on the pipe. Typical hand-bender charts read 5 inches on 1/2-inch EMT, 6 inches on 3/4-inch, and 8 inches on 1-inch. Those numbers move with Ideal, Klein, and Greenlee shoes, and they move again when the hook is worn. The calculator lets you type the take-up your bender actually uses.

Three-point saddles clear a round or narrow obstacle. Mark the center of the obstruction, then measure 2.5 times the obstruction height to each side. Bend 22.5° on the near mark with the handle toward the center, 45° on the center mark the other way, then 22.5° on the remaining mark. Four-point saddles are for wider obstacles: two inner marks set to the obstruction width, two outer marks set with the same multiplier you would use on an offset of that height.

NEC 344.26 and 358.26 still cap you at 360 degrees of bend between pull points. Two 90s and an offset can eat that budget before you notice. The cheat sheet will not count degrees for you. Count them on the run. PVC heat bends, concentric parallel bends, and rolling offsets that move in two planes at once are outside this chart — use a dedicated method for those.

Print the tables, tape them inside the bender handle bag, and keep the live calculator for odd heights. Marks on WattsCalc round to the nearest 1/16 inch, which is what a pencil and a speed square can actually hold on EMT.