Nailed wood reels

The workhorse of the reel yard

Most empty reels left on Delaware Valley job sites are nailed wood reels. Cable mills ship building wire, feeders and medium-voltage cable on them because they are cheap to build, strong for their weight and sent one-way, so nobody has to pay to haul them back. Southwire's reel information describes its wooden reels as non-returnable with no deposit required, and other North American cable makers ship the same way. That makes the nailed wood reel the reel most people actually own, and the one we buy and collect most.

How a nailed reel is built

Each flange is two layers of boards laid at right angles and nailed through, which Southwire describes as two-ply flanges nailed at 90 degrees. The crosswise layers are what keep a big flange from splitting along the grain. The drum is a ring of narrow wooden staves nailed between the two flanges, like a short barrel, and on many reels a couple of tie rods or long bolts run through the drum to hold the flanges tight. The centre has a round arbor hole, which on Southwire's wood reels is 3⅛ inches, and smaller drive holes beside it take the pin of a reel stand. Lagging boards, nailed across the flange rims, cover the cable in transit and are pulled off on site.

Sizes we see

Nailed reels run from small 23- and 24-inch reels for building wire up to the high 60s, where they start to overlap with bolted wood reels and large wooden spools. Southwire's published examples include its C-3 at 23 x 10 x 12 inches, the A-10 at 30 x 22 x 16 inches and 66 pounds, the A-29 at 42 x 28 x 21 inches and 154 pounds, the A-38 at 48 x 28 x 24 inches and 212 pounds, the A-62 at 60 x 28 x 28 inches and about 397 pounds, and the A-99 at 68 x 38 x 36 inches. The size pages list these with their sources: the 30-inch, 42-inch and 48-inch classes are the busiest.

When a nailed reel sells

A nailed reel is worth collecting for reuse when:

• both flanges are flat and every board in both layers is whole;
• the drum's staves are all present and tight, with no rattle when the reel rolls;
• the arbor hole is round and the wood around it is not split or burnt;
• the bottom rim is not soft from standing on wet ground;
• the lagging nails have been pulled or can be.

Those reels go to contractors and rewinders who wind cable onto them again, and to makers who build tables from the 24- to 48-inch sizes. Matched groups of one size are worth more than a mixed pile.

When it recycles

Nailed reels fail in predictable ways: a fork through a flange, a corner of the rim knocked off when the reel was dropped, staves that shrank loose after a wet winter, or rot along the bottom edge. Any of those makes the reel recycling only. It is still collected, taken apart, and its boards and nails sent to wood and metal recycling. See broken reels for the full list of faults.

Stencils and ownership

Plain nailed reels with only a paper shipping label are one-way. If a nailed reel has a cable maker's name stencilled in large letters on the flange face, a painted serial number, or a metal tag near the arbor hole, check before you sell it. Some makers stencil wooden reels that they want back, and Service Wire's reel return, for example, takes back its own-label nailed wood reels between 30 and 72 inches. The returnable entry explains how to tell.

Handling

Up to about 30 inches, one person can roll a nailed reel on level ground and two can lift it. From 36 inches the reel is heavy enough that it should be rolled, not carried, and from 48 inches up it needs a forklift with forks under the drum. Never lift a nailed reel with forks through the flange boards; that is the commonest cause of a split flange.

Nailed reels in this market

Nailed reels collect across the Delaware Valley wherever building wire and feeders are pulled: office and lab fit-outs in University City and King of Prussia, school and hospital work across the suburbs, warehouses along the I-95 and Route 130 corridors, and new housing in Chester and Gloucester counties. Most empties end up back at the electrical contractor's shop or at the distributor's yard.

Clinched nails and splinters

Nailed reels hold together because nails are driven through flange boards into battens or staves and clinched on the far side. Over time, clinched points can work loose and stick out, especially after a reel has been rolled across rough ground. Before using one as furniture, run a hand carefully across both faces, hammer down or pull any proud nails, and sand.

Questions

How do I know a reel is nailed rather than bolted?

Look at the flange face. A nailed reel shows rows of nail heads across the boards and no large bolts. A bolted reel has big nuts and washers where tie rods come through the flanges, and often a steel arbor plate.

Are old nailed reels worth anything?

If they are sound, yes, in the same way as new ones. Age makes no difference; condition does.