Compare two power rack uprights by tube size, wall gauge and bending direction. The calculator shows how many times stiffer one upright is than the other, plus the steel weight per foot. Stiffness is not a load rating, so check the maker’s tested rating for capacity.
Upright stiffness calculator
Compare two uprights by tube size, wall gauge and bending direction. It uses the standard moment-of-inertia formula for a square-cornered tube.
Upright A
Upright B
Idealized square-cornered tubes; real tubing has rounded corners, which lowers each value a few percent without changing the ranking. Weight assumes steel at 0.284 lb per cubic inch. Stiffness is not a load rating: it tells you how much an upright moves, not when it fails.
For the reasoning, the sources and what the numbers mean, read the full guide: 11-Gauge vs 14-Gauge Steel Racks: Does It Matter?. More free tools are on the tools page.