ACSR conductor buyer in Syracuse

What a Syracuse-area lot looks like

The typical lot is five to fifteen part reels of three or four code names, some still banded, some opened and re-tied, plus a few cut coils from storm work. Linnet at 336.4 kcmil is the most common size, with Hawk at 477 and Dove at 556.5 close behind; 795 kcmil Drake appears when a heavier line has been touched. Each code name has to be identified separately because each has a different use and a different price.

The condition question is nearly always the same: was this on a line, or did it come off a project unused? Served conductor shows clamp marks every forty or fifty feet, armour rod impressions at the supports and a dulled surface. Unused surplus is bright, still has the factory lagging and usually has the reel tag wired to the reel. Mixing the two on one pallet is the fastest way to lose value, because the whole pallet then gets treated as recovery.

Ice and wind damage is the third category. A span that failed in a storm has kinks, birdcaging and broken strands, and it is worth the metal plus whatever clean lengths can be cut out of it. Tell us how it failed; a clean cut-out from a storm job is very different from a coil that was dragged off a right-of-way behind a truck.

• Code name and stranding on every reel, even if it is only marker on the flange
• Footage from the tag, or measured from the wrap diameter if the tag is gone
• Served versus unused, and whether clamp marks are present
• Core condition at the cut ends, checked before the reel is quoted
• Whether the reels are banded and can be lifted without collapsing

Loading conductor out of a contractor yard

Syracuse yards are usually reachable by tractor-trailer, which is not true everywhere in the state. I-81 runs north-south through the city, the Thruway crosses east-west, and CSX serves the industrial belts on both sides. A flatbed can normally get to the gate; the question is whether it can get to the rack, and whether a forklift rated for a loaded reel is available or the reel has to be lifted by a boom.

A full reel of 477 kcmil on a wooden reel is not a two-person lift, and a reel that has stood outdoors for years may have a rotten flange that will not survive being picked. If the reel is unsound, the conductor has to be coiled or spooled onto something else before it travels, and that is a yard job rather than a loading job.

Winter changes the timetable but not the plan. Reels stored on gravel freeze in, and a January morning is not the time to discover that the yard has not been plowed. Give us the address, the gate width, the equipment on site and a second date, and a mixed rack can usually leave in one trip instead of three.