66-inch cable reels: utility-sized wood and steel

Same size, different reel

The A-76 and N-76 make a useful lesson. Both are 66 inches across with a 28-inch traverse and 30-inch drum. One is listed at 473 pounds, the other at about 370. The difference is the build: Southwire’s A series is designed for heavier bare conductor, its N series for lighter insulated products. When you tell the desk about a 66, the reel code on the tag or stencil tells us which one we are lifting.

The steel 66

Southwire’s S-77 is a steel 66-inch reel with a 32-inch traverse and a 36-inch drum, catalogued under the Aluminum Association’s “RM” code for returnable metal reels. It carries a charge on the invoice. If one is in your yard, it is the maker’s: arrange the return and keep the paperwork, because the credit depends on the return date.

Handling

These are machine reels. A forklift with forks long enough to reach under both flanges, or a crane or boom with a shaft through the arbor and a spreader bar. Load them standing; AFL’s table shows that nesting a row (flanges overlapped where the drums allow) fits 24 in a van against 18 standing apart.

Where 66s come from here

Utility work, mostly: overhead conductor and underground cable for Pepco in Prince George’s and Montgomery, SMECO in Charles County, Dominion’s transmission work in Loudoun. Large data-centre campuses in Loudoun and Prince William use them for medium-voltage feeders.

Once empty

A sound 66-inch nailed reel is worth more as a reel than as wood: contractors and farms who need to wind heavy material want them, and some landscapers use them as feature pieces. Broken ones go to recycling, where the lumber and the steel hub hardware are separated.

Published dimensions at and near 66 inches

Two wooden reels with identical dimensions and a hundred pounds' difference in weight: the A-76 is built for heavier conductor than the N-76.

Reading the numbers

Flange

The diameter of the round end, edge to edge. The size a reel is known by.

Traverse

The inside width between the flanges, where cable winds. It sets how tall the reel stands on end.

Drum

The diameter of the barrel the cable winds onto. Stiff power cable needs a big drum.

Arbor hole

The centre hole for a shaft. 3⅛ in on most wooden reels; 5¼ in and up on heavy steel ones.

Weight

Empty, or tare, weight in pounds as the maker publishes it. A tag on the reel gives the same figure.

Series letter

Southwire codes the build: A and C nailed, N plywood or nailed, E and G plywood, S steel.

Where 66s turn up here

Transmission and distribution yards, and the switchgear and substation stages of data-centre campuses. A 66 is too big for most trailers to carry more than two or three abreast, so a pickup of a dozen means a flatbed with chains and binders and a driver who has loaded reels before. Tell the desk if the yard has a loader or only a forklift.

Requests for 66-inch reels

Selling or clearing

A sound nailed 66-inch reel meets the size rules of the programs we have read; count by brand first in case one maker's reels fill a truck (24 at this size, by Sonoco's table). Send the desk the rest.

Buying

Say what will lift it at your end (tractor forks, loader, crane) and where it will stand.

Empty weight to plan for

370 to 473 lb (wood)