The Buckland pdf is very nicely detailed. From Buckland's pictures it looks like there are some dimensional differences between his 2011 and my 2001 Eagle so I'll leave my details in this post. I'm quite sure the OP's 2002 is very similar to mine. The short answer to the OP's question is that my struts are 36". The following is probably way more info than the OP wants but I'll leave it here anyway...
First of all, keep in mind that the guiding principle seems to be to adjust the install for the situation you have, meaning if your buckle clamps are positioned differently than mine you should adjust as needed because the strut brackets need to be mounted inboard of the buckle clamps. I had the factory install mine because the camper was already in their shop for a new one-piece roof and a few other things. They did not remove/relocate the existing buckle clamps but instead mounted the strut brackets immediately adjacent and inboard of the buckles. The strut brackets are butted directly next to the buckle clips. on the roof.
The factory installed the following struts: (I got this info from
http://www.suspaparts.com)
Front: Suspa #C16-28169
Center-to-Center Length * Extended 35.43" (900mm) * Compressed 19.29" (490mm) Force 20 lbs (89 N)
Rear: Suspa #C16-22241 ... no details on Suspa website... Strut label shows 30 lbs and gas cylinder body is same length as front struts
[SIZE=13.3333px]I went with the factory recommendation of 20 pound struts in front and 30 in rear because I have a bare roof with no racks or other attachments. It has worked well and I would have problems lowering the roof if the struts were higher pounds/pressure. I still have some struggles raising the front because I can't get a good body position when trying to push up on the wide board toward the front. I tried switching the struts to use the 30 pounds in the front but then I couldn't lower it. Even today with the 20 pound strut on the front the roof will try to go back up on it's own when I'm closing the camper top. The rear seems to work fine for me with 30 pound struts. I also have to pull down the rear roof a little bit to overcome some of the strut assistance when lowering. A little bit of sunshine and warm weather will increase the strut assistance dramatically, while cold temperatures and shade will reduce the power of the struts. As Buckland noted, consider getting struts with higher pressures if you have roof attachments.[/SIZE]
Installation locations: With the 36" struts the factory installed the roof brackets immediately inboard of the roof clips, which on the front is about 14 inches from the outside edge of the roof (the rear is different as noted in the next paragraph). The struts attach to the body of camper in the middle of the 4wheel decal on the front. On the outside of the camper each of the two lower ball brackets that are mounted in the middle of the decal have a 1.5" washer around them, and those washers are touching each other in the middle and also touching the lower molding trim. If you line those washers up accordingly, you have the location where to drill the holes through the camper for the front lower ball brackets. I can't see what's on the inside of those front attachment points. Perhaps there's another washer if space permits. When the roof is closed the front strut is just about fully collapsed and only a 1/2" of the center rod is exposed outside of the pressure cylinder. You don't have much leeway for mounting the strut brackets if your existing clamps are in the same position as I noted above and you don't intend to relocate them.
On the rear installation the strut bracket on the top begins 4" from the outside edge of the roof. This is immediately adjacent to the clip. I have only one clamp on the rear, which is on the passenger side and is much closer to the outside edge than the front clamps. Since they mounted the rear passenger side strut bracket next to the clip, they just mirrored the same 4" dimension on the driver side even though there is no clamp. The lower ball brackets do not have a 1.5" wash on the outside, but instead those washers appear on the inside above the rear door. It looks like they didn't have enough room for the washers on the outside because of the rear door frame. The lower ball brackets are spaced differently from the front installation (probably because the upper bracket is much closer to the edge when compared to the front). The rear lower ball brackets are mounted in holes that are 13" apart when measured from the center of each bolt hole. Each of the holes are about 27.5" from the outside edge of the camper and thus are centered across the back. When the top is closed the struts are not as compressed as the front struts. There's still 3.5" of exposed strut that is sticking out of the pressure tube.
Hope all this helps with an install of struts on a turn-of-the-century Eagle (approx 1999-2005).