Construction & estimating · Site operations
Trench shoring take-off calculator
Panels, strut rows and struts for a strutted trench, with excavation volume and hire cost.
Standard: Shield / panel and strut count · hire cost
Open the live calculator → All construction & estimating calculators
Inputs in the worked example
The live calculator starts with these values; change any of them and every result, check and diagram updates instantly.
| Input | Value | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| Trench length | 60 | m |
| Width | 1.2 | m |
| Depth | 3.2 | m |
| Panel length | 3 | m |
| Vertical strut spacing | 1.2 | m |
| Horizontal strut spacing | 2.4 | m |
| Hire period | 15 | d |
| Panel hire | 18 | $/d |
| Strut hire | 4 | $/d |
Worked example — results
| Result | Value | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| Panels (both sides) | 40 | |
| Strut rows | 3 | |
| Struts | 78 | |
| Excavation | 230.4 | m³ |
| Supported face area | 384 | m² |
| Hire cost | $15,480 |
- ✓ Depth over 1.5 m is supported (WHS)
Method, formulas and assumptions
- Panels = 2⌈L/panel⌉; struts = (⌈L/sh⌉ + 1) × rows
- The shoring system needs engineering design for the soil, surcharge and groundwater
- Rates and productivities are example inputs. Replace them with supplier, plant-hire and crew figures for your site.
Related construction & estimating calculators
- Concrete pour planner — Number of agitator trucks, trucks needed in rotation, pour duration, finish time and cost for a concrete pour.
- Rebar cutting length and laps — Cutting length for straight, L, U or closed-link bars with bend deductions and hooks, the laps needed for…
- Aggregate and base-course tonnage — Tonnes of road base, crushed rock or sand for an area and compacted thickness, with loose volume, truck…
- Compaction production and lifts — Number of lifts, roller output and days to place and compact a fill platform.
- Excavation dewatering estimate — Inflow to a dewatered excavation treated as an equivalent large-diameter well in an unconfined aquifer, with…
- Truck and loader fleet balance — Truck cycle time, trucks needed to keep the loader busy, fleet production and hours to move a volume.
- Plant fuel and CO₂ — Diesel use, cost and CO₂ for a plant fleet from rated power, load factor and specific fuel consumption.
- Scaffold take-off (modular) — Component count for a single-run modular scaffold, with tie count and hire cost.
- Concrete maturity (strength in place) — Temperature–time factor and equivalent age from logged temperatures, and estimated in-place strength from a…
- Concrete mix design (ACI 211.1) — Batch quantities per m³ (water, cement, coarse and fine aggregate) by the ACI absolute-volume method.
For preliminary design and education. Check every result against the current standard and your own engineering judgement before use.