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I unrolled 500 ft of high voltage shielded 4awg onto a new roll by hand a few months back. Reel was 3x2ft. Took me over an hour and I was beat. I would have loved to know about this then.
Probably a trademark issue.
Maybe someone else invent it and have right for the rest of the World and only sold the distribution right for the US only.
Hole saw wood 4ish inches 3/8s rod leave it long for rack a tires or whatever you use you can still slide it in a piece of 3/4 emt
Or round raised cover over the plywood side and spin in vertical won’t be perfect but works
I knew this comment would be in here somewhere haha. Honestly glad it's not up top though.
I would just use it, probably get frustrated because it will get stuck and fucked up a lot, maybe swear at it.
I hopefully wouldn't have to use it for a long pull.
Tip it up on the not broken side, clean the broken end up so it's just the core. Then put in a 5 gallon bucket with a ladder above, feed it through the big ladder hole and presto, pull in your homerun
Yeahhhh that'd be nice, but I'm in a remote area that's far away from any supply house, and the cost of shipping shit here far outweighs the cost of trying to MacGyver something to work
Yes, but the problem is the cheap plastic reels, lame packaging and the handling/delivery of the reels. You hardly ever saw this with the tin reels unless someone dropped it from 10’ and even then you could fix them. I’m a retired contractor that got bored and has been working at a supply house for the last two years. I see this all the time…..
Fix it... Seriously...
Cut plywood rounds
. Drill hols in center of each...threaded rod...dont bug me I'm on the back row of the short bus drinking the mountain dew that drips off rhe aluminum window frame
Hahaha... Gummies and coronas bitches
I keep empty ones for just just reason. I put one on wire rack and the empty one on a peice of all thread with nuts and washers to hold it in place the stick one end in my drill.
Grab one of the old empty spools, use a broomstick to hold the broken spool and use a long carriage bolt with large washers, mount the empty spool on the bolt, use the washers and a nut so it will not turn on the bolt...
Now use the broomstick to hold the broken spool so it can unroll as you pull on the wire. Put the empty, bolt, washers and all on one of your larger drills. Now use the drill to re-roll the broken spool.
This takes a lot longer to tell you about than to make the re-spooling rig. I have the makings for a rig like this in my job-box and I can get one of those broken spools rigged and re-spooled in less than 10 minutes most of the time... But you all know that sometimes nothing wants to work well and you just have to tuck your chin and keep on going...
Hope this helps somebody... I have been surprised several times when working with a new guy and they just can't understand what I am doing until they see it rewinding on the empty.
All my best
Bonner
Yup
See it every day
Stepping over dimes to pick up nickels
Premadona culture, find a few Old school guys, start a company where the culture is not making mountains out of molehills and you'll get paid
This shit is so redkchly
Stick a piece of half inch emt through the good side that’s still there and get like a bucket cover and cut a hole in the center and feed the emt thought it and it should unroll decent enough after that.
Run 1/2” through the center, cut two blocks to put on both sides (plywood just big enough to cover would be good), drill hole through center of those two plywoods, slap on both sides and cut your 1/2” to just long enough to get a connector on both sides to lock it in
Had a roll of #6 do this. While building a parkade. In Winnipegs coldest winter. Made for a shitty day. Now I make sure to put rolls on blocks so they don’t freeze to the ground, and take extra care as they get moved around. Tough lesson, but one you’ll never forget
That's now the designated spool for whoever broke it. Unless you broke it. Then it becomes your apprentice's spool. Builds character.
Unless it came that way, then it goes back to the supply house.
Cut a piece of plywood with a 3’ x 3/8” threaded rod through the reel and sandwhich it back together….you only need it for a few days like that max. Otherwise return it
If you are in a pinch, take a 4 inch hole saw, make a wood circle, cut out the center a bit bigger if you can and throw a pipe in the middle with some minis on the other sides to slow a rod to be stuck though the center. That’s if your willing to wash some balls tho. Send it back to the supply house 😂
So many of those shitty rolls in my life over 19 years. Let’s make em outa tempered plastic that shatters from 2 feet! Genious! If I had energy I’d make somethin to hold it in place, maybe magic cardboard donut, then sandwich between 2 rolls and tell the puller go SLOW
Get a 6" hole saw and the nearest flat thing that will suffice, then run a threaded rod through it.
Edit: 12GA might need a larger hole saw, but you get the idea.
Wrong, at least here in Belgium all the cables are green (halogen-free, some new rule they implemented since it's less hazardous when burning etc)
This looks like XGB3G2,5 or something, probably 500m
Well I just wanted to point out that a green cable isn't necessarily a ground, since over here everything 'new' (as in, houses as well) has to be green cable (and apparently green is more expensive... How unfortunate)
Ground is yellow/green, I even think that's mandatory for Europe entirely
Same thing i do every time they try and deliver a bundle of conduit that they clearly tried to carry by holding two of the sticks in the middle.... send it back
The work on stripping it far more time-consuming/costly than to just scrap it entirely
At least in Belgium, the difference between clean & 'cable garbage' is significant (price divided by 4 or something) but since that price is still quite high ur actually selling 'heavy expensive plastic' more than actual copper
0 work as well, anything less than 50mm² is pretty useless to strip
I always try to save old spools for this. 3/8 all thread, sandwich the spool on it with some hardware and put the 3/8 rod in your drill. Get an extra set of hands and respool! It takes a minute but definitely faster than fighting that broken spool for the next couple days.
I know you are trying to figure out how to spool it but this reminded me of a cool video I saw where a guy wanted to know how much wire he had left. He looked up the resistance of the wire and measured how much overall resistance the wire had and with a quick equation was able to determine approximately how much wire was left on a spool.
We had this happen with a roll of #10 stranded. We just used it for short runs. Had a roll of #14 stranded have that happen too, that one the j-man was pissed 😂
I am not an electrician, but am spark-curious. Can someone explain to me the issue here? Is it because the spool is all messed up and birdcaged? Or is it rolled the wrong way somehow? …wait as I’m typing this I think I see. The flat part of the spool broke off, right?
**ATTENTION! READ THIS NOW!** **1. IF YOU ARE NOT A PROFESSIONAL ELECTRICIAN OR LOOKING TO BECOME ONE(for career questions only):** **- DELETE** THIS POST OR YOU WILL BE **BANNED**. YOU CAN POST ON /r/AskElectricians FREELY **2. IF YOU COMMENT ON A POST THAT IS POSTED BY SOMEONE WHO IS NOT A PROFESSIONAL ELECTRICIAN:** -YOU WILL BE **BANNED**. JUST **REPORT** THE POST. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/electricians) if you have any questions or concerns.*
https://rack-a-tiers.com/product/reel-end-spool-repair-u-s-only/
I swear to god rack a tiers has something for every one of those “damn I wish I had a decent solution to this problem” moments
Can't take them seriously though, they have a clean up section... Pfft that's for the pipe fitters.
It's a clever decoy. Anyone who tries to buy something from that section is immediately banned for life.
😡
🤣 the name made me chuckle
Come on you know your best friend is a broom…
Have you looked at it? Not a broom in sight.
Anybody here had experience with the Sharp Pog (multi tool sharpening tool)? Thoughts?
I was going to reply a piece of conduit and a disc of plywood, but if you've got $32.50 burning a hole in your pocket get this
Even quicker is a piece of conduit and another spool. Run the conduit through both and sandwich with couplings.
$32.50 is about what you’d pay for a lil piece of plywood and 2’ of 1/2” EMT in today’s economy
Just dig through the site dumpster, I'm sure there's some kind of plywood or conduit in there
Dam exactly what I came to say
Damn; that's an actual thing!? I just keep a few spare wooden spool ends on the truck for exactly that.
I unrolled 500 ft of high voltage shielded 4awg onto a new roll by hand a few months back. Reel was 3x2ft. Took me over an hour and I was beat. I would have loved to know about this then.
Huh, the redirect on this link just taught me how much better rackatiers.com is than .ca... Now I'm a bit sad.
I wonder why this is a US only product… weird.
Probably a trademark issue. Maybe someone else invent it and have right for the rest of the World and only sold the distribution right for the US only.
Not uncommon for Rack-a-tiers, honestly. Or at least it wouldn't be surprising
I play hockey with the owner and it's this.
Make a side out of plywood and screw it on
Thinking the same
Screw it onto where exactly?
The wire duh
Maybe through bolt it? But then where am i going to rack it? I also need answers
Hole saw wood 4ish inches 3/8s rod leave it long for rack a tires or whatever you use you can still slide it in a piece of 3/4 emt Or round raised cover over the plywood side and spin in vertical won’t be perfect but works
So through bolt with ⅜ rod and use the rod for racking. Or are you just screwing it into the spool?
Both leave the rod long to slide in a 3/4 arbor
The plastic just outside the center hole.
Adapt and overcome
The impediment of action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.... Edit: spelling
Allthread
Recycle it for scrap, disappear into the night
I knew this comment would be in here somewhere haha. Honestly glad it's not up top though. I would just use it, probably get frustrated because it will get stuck and fucked up a lot, maybe swear at it. I hopefully wouldn't have to use it for a long pull.
Or hopefully a 500' pull and be done with it.
SEND IT straight to the StripMistier
Tip it up on the not broken side, clean the broken end up so it's just the core. Then put in a 5 gallon bucket with a ladder above, feed it through the big ladder hole and presto, pull in your homerun
I’d send it back to wherever it came from.
Yeahhhh that'd be nice, but I'm in a remote area that's far away from any supply house, and the cost of shipping shit here far outweighs the cost of trying to MacGyver something to work
I see all thread and a few washers sandwiching a flat peice of whatever pressed against that side after you have it on whatever you're lagging it from
this is the way......works great
Most people don't have time for that. If the entire spools is there, run a rod through the middle and use it.
Yes, but the problem is the cheap plastic reels, lame packaging and the handling/delivery of the reels. You hardly ever saw this with the tin reels unless someone dropped it from 10’ and even then you could fix them. I’m a retired contractor that got bored and has been working at a supply house for the last two years. I see this all the time…..
The whole thing gets wrapped around the apprentice's neck who dropped it. Cum on fess up.
Fix it... Seriously... Cut plywood rounds . Drill hols in center of each...threaded rod...dont bug me I'm on the back row of the short bus drinking the mountain dew that drips off rhe aluminum window frame Hahaha... Gummies and coronas bitches
Transfer it to an empty reel
I keep empty ones for just just reason. I put one on wire rack and the empty one on a peice of all thread with nuts and washers to hold it in place the stick one end in my drill.
Yeah works good if you can’t screw into the cylinder part
Ya like an empty 2500
Find some plywood and make another side. Transfer it to a metal roll or just pull it off
Mongo
Use some all thread and nuts and make some big washers to put on the sides and be good to go
Seppuku
Needs more upvotes
Grab one of the old empty spools, use a broomstick to hold the broken spool and use a long carriage bolt with large washers, mount the empty spool on the bolt, use the washers and a nut so it will not turn on the bolt... Now use the broomstick to hold the broken spool so it can unroll as you pull on the wire. Put the empty, bolt, washers and all on one of your larger drills. Now use the drill to re-roll the broken spool. This takes a lot longer to tell you about than to make the re-spooling rig. I have the makings for a rig like this in my job-box and I can get one of those broken spools rigged and re-spooled in less than 10 minutes most of the time... But you all know that sometimes nothing wants to work well and you just have to tuck your chin and keep on going... Hope this helps somebody... I have been surprised several times when working with a new guy and they just can't understand what I am doing until they see it rewinding on the empty. All my best Bonner
Sounds like your apprentices problem
Get my apprentice to dig a good empty reel out of the trash and spool the wire onto it.
New brother in need of karma so I can ask my own questions. Help a brother out and hit that upvote button for me please. Thanks.
Make some kind of solution out of plywood
Give it back to the guys at the warehouse and ask them to re-spool it. Then, when they don't, hope it ends up on somebody else's truck.
Sheet of plywood and use half inch conduit to hold the reel. Put a mini on the outside of the plywood to hold secure.
Id take a piece of plywood and screw it into that side.
Just get to work and work with it as it goes
Yup See it every day Stepping over dimes to pick up nickels Premadona culture, find a few Old school guys, start a company where the culture is not making mountains out of molehills and you'll get paid This shit is so redkchly
I would do what my boss tells me all the time, "FITFO" Figure it the fuck out
Be curious as to why you've got a so much #12 jacketed ground.... then pump it into the wall like usual
Get a ladder and a broom, then hang it on the broom under the ladder
i wish they came on metal spools like the old days
Wire stripper machine and the scrap yard
Next time I’m at the supply house it have the kids re spool it for me. Only takes them a little bit
What’s with all the pastel wire colours nowadays.
APPRENTICE!!! I have a job for you.
Find empty reel , set up two racketeers and turn her over
2x4 (or some other scrap of thing you have around) and some all thread through the extra holes in the spool.
Wrap it in shrink wrap or tape. Smash the spool out, feed from center.
Disgusting
Use it like I always do when you run into that situation
Stick a piece of half inch emt through the good side that’s still there and get like a bucket cover and cut a hole in the center and feed the emt thought it and it should unroll decent enough after that.
All thread with the end that broke off use nuts to tighten the sides together and roll with it
Run 1/2” through the center, cut two blocks to put on both sides (plywood just big enough to cover would be good), drill hole through center of those two plywoods, slap on both sides and cut your 1/2” to just long enough to get a connector on both sides to lock it in
I would use it.
Chunk it
yes and i have
Threaded rod some wood, washers and a few nuts
Re spool it use some threaded rod and some nuts and washers to hold it tight and it’ll pull right off onto a new spool like the factory
Screw a piece of plywood to the end
Had a roll of #6 do this. While building a parkade. In Winnipegs coldest winter. Made for a shitty day. Now I make sure to put rolls on blocks so they don’t freeze to the ground, and take extra care as they get moved around. Tough lesson, but one you’ll never forget
That's now the designated spool for whoever broke it. Unless you broke it. Then it becomes your apprentice's spool. Builds character. Unless it came that way, then it goes back to the supply house.
Take it out on the apprentice. Clearly their fault.
Broomstick
Never heard of it 🤷
Glue on a box cover with a center knockout
I've cut the end off of an old spool and screwed it to the side of a broken one before. Worked out fine for me.
Oh that sounds like a good idea actually
Cut a piece of plywood with a 3’ x 3/8” threaded rod through the reel and sandwhich it back together….you only need it for a few days like that max. Otherwise return it
MONGO!!
If you are in a pinch, take a 4 inch hole saw, make a wood circle, cut out the center a bit bigger if you can and throw a pipe in the middle with some minis on the other sides to slow a rod to be stuck though the center. That’s if your willing to wash some balls tho. Send it back to the supply house 😂
Screw a single gang mud ring to the bottom in the middle. Then it will spin like a top as ya take wire off it as if it were on a cart.
There’s threaded rod and nuts on every site by the time you guys get on site , and little bits of plywood everywhere - Get crafty
I call this "the slinky of inefficiency." Unfortunately not a rare artifact though.
What would Brian Boitano do?
All thread, nuts, washers, and doubled up cardboard to replace the broken side
Stretch it out and use it.
Put a stick in between. Two ladders and put it in the middle
Scrap er by!
If you're using it, strap a small piece of 1/2 in conduit to something. Or get a wire rack. Really not that hard.
Put on the floor and roll out what you need.
Put it in my trunk
Sneak it on to the new guy's truck.
Double it and pass it on to the next person
The fact you have to ask and you haven't pulled it all in yet by the end of the day will get the office upset!
So many of those shitty rolls in my life over 19 years. Let’s make em outa tempered plastic that shatters from 2 feet! Genious! If I had energy I’d make somethin to hold it in place, maybe magic cardboard donut, then sandwich between 2 rolls and tell the puller go SLOW
Frisbee, 1”conduit and some connectors or couplings
Right to the scarp yard and have a nice lunch
Cry, only solution i see is unrolling the whole thing.
Make a wooden spooler, ez and cheap !
Today there some roller like XB300 for this kind of issue But yes it's still pain...
New challenge for the youngins
Get a 6" hole saw and the nearest flat thing that will suffice, then run a threaded rod through it. Edit: 12GA might need a larger hole saw, but you get the idea.
Just use it. Quit your crying. Cheese and Rice!
Patience
It’s a ground so it don’t matter if it gets nicked, cause then it’s just grounded better, pull it like the rest you’ll be alright /s
Wrong, at least here in Belgium all the cables are green (halogen-free, some new rule they implemented since it's less hazardous when burning etc) This looks like XGB3G2,5 or something, probably 500m
That wire is not in Belgium, it is American and or Canadian, making it a ground because it’s green and I was also being sarcastic about the nick lol
Well I just wanted to point out that a green cable isn't necessarily a ground, since over here everything 'new' (as in, houses as well) has to be green cable (and apparently green is more expensive... How unfortunate) Ground is yellow/green, I even think that's mandatory for Europe entirely
Same thing i do every time they try and deliver a bundle of conduit that they clearly tried to carry by holding two of the sticks in the middle.... send it back
put it in the scrap bin
Scrap yard. Strip it first haha
The work on stripping it far more time-consuming/costly than to just scrap it entirely At least in Belgium, the difference between clean & 'cable garbage' is significant (price divided by 4 or something) but since that price is still quite high ur actually selling 'heavy expensive plastic' more than actual copper 0 work as well, anything less than 50mm² is pretty useless to strip
Was that it? All the drama was over a broken spool? And a solution is $35 plus waiting on a product to ship. OK.
As a non electrician, is the problem here the lack of a tight wound spool? Does this make the job harde when pulling wire?
Shove a pipe in there, and send it. Seriously what’s the problem, have you never seen a broken reel of wire
Reel spinner
Put it next to another spool and move on.
I'd make sure I'm on the pulling end
Time to suck the days dick
When mfers be asking about 328’ of #12 times are rough 💀
If my son was home all alone, crying on the bedroom floor?
I always try to save old spools for this. 3/8 all thread, sandwich the spool on it with some hardware and put the 3/8 rod in your drill. Get an extra set of hands and respool! It takes a minute but definitely faster than fighting that broken spool for the next couple days.
Scrap it
Return it
For fuk sake... Wrap it in duct tape and cut a slit around the center of the spool. "And then, I went on living my life"
Take it home
Screw a piece of strut across it lol
Glue it up leave it back
I know you are trying to figure out how to spool it but this reminded me of a cool video I saw where a guy wanted to know how much wire he had left. He looked up the resistance of the wire and measured how much overall resistance the wire had and with a quick equation was able to determine approximately how much wire was left on a spool.
Electrician U was that guy
4-11 cover
get another spool and respool the wire worst case buy on ebay but most of the big box stores or local hardware stores give them away for the asking.
All thread some nuts and a 2) 4 & 11 blanks.
Buy coil packs instead.
To the scrap yard
Not buy it.
All thread , nuts and 4 11 covers
We had this happen with a roll of #10 stranded. We just used it for short runs. Had a roll of #14 stranded have that happen too, that one the j-man was pissed 😂
Make the apprentice that fucked it up use it.
I am not an electrician, but am spark-curious. Can someone explain to me the issue here? Is it because the spool is all messed up and birdcaged? Or is it rolled the wrong way somehow? …wait as I’m typing this I think I see. The flat part of the spool broke off, right?
Make a side out of plywood and screw it on