I tried a run with a length_calculator add and still didn't work. I even tried to run a conversion with the only transformers being a length_calculator and it still gave me 0's for pipes that run vertically, pipes that run horizontally come through fine. Attached is a screenshot of my work space without a length calculator. It my be doing something wrong when I add the Length Calculator. I am new to FME. Also note in the Parameters annotation box Z has been off set for each drawing. I dont know if this could be a problem. Workspace.PNG
FileGDB doesn't know its way with vertical lines. The SHAPE_Lentgh attributen is calculated in 2D. Thuis vertical lines won't receive a balie.
As @fkemminje proposes, you van use a LengthCalculator transformer to calculate the 3D length in a separate attribute. However you will need to adjust the transformer settings, because by default it will do a 2D calculation.
add length_calculator transformer and save length as an attribute, then you will get it for entire fme session