What is the effect of changing the cut length in Bolt Properties?

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Tekla Structures

Environment

Not environment-specific

Question:
What is the effect of changing the Cut length in Bolt Properties?

Answer:
The Cut length defines the distance Tekla Structures should search for parts that belong to the bolt group. Parts that are outside the cut length will not be connected by the bolt. If the cut length is A, the search distance is A/2 in both directions from the bolt origin.

Example

The following example shows the effect of different Cut length settings on a bolt placed between the steel parts shown below. The location of the bolt origin is on the plane between the two parts.

The cut length is centred on the bolt origin and extends an equal distance above and below it. The top plate is 10mm thick, so for the bolt to successfully pass through from the bolt origin to the top surface of the plate the Cut length must be at least 20mm. As shown below. If the Cut length is 19mm the distance above the bolt origin is 9.5mm so the bolt head is not placed above the top plate.

If the Cut length is increased to 20mm, the bolt head will be placed above the top plate but the nut is still not placed on the underside of the flange because the flange thickness is greater than 10mm.

For the nut to be placed below the flange the Cut length must be at lease twice the flange width. In this case 41mm.

If you want the bolt to go through the top and bottom flange, the Cut length should be increased to at least twice the distance from the bolt origin to the bottom of the bottom flange.