City · Steuben County
Wire and cable buyers in Hornell
A transit and rail car building town in a river valley, where welding, heavy fabrication and component machining put a specific kind of cable into the surplus stream.
Sell wire in Hornell
Tell us what is stored in Hornell, how it is stored and what can reach it.
Prefer to talk? 614-715-3047 · saleselectricalbuyers@gmail.com
Hornell surplus is welding and heavy fabrication cable first: lead and ground cable, heavy feeder to welding stations, plasma and gouging leads, plus crane and hoist cable, control cable and machine tool feeder from the component shops. Lots are heavy, often outdoor-stored and rarely pretty. Access is a valley problem — tight streets, limited yard space, winter.
Rail cars, welding and the valley economy
Hornell makes things that are large and made of steel. Transit and rail car manufacturing is the anchor: car bodies, frames and assemblies welded and finished in shops built for the purpose, with paint, test and inspection at the end of the line. That kind of work is electrically simple in principle and enormous in practice — hundreds of welding stations, heavy services, cranes overhead and a great deal of cable that moves every day.
Around the car shops sits a supplier base doing heavy fabrication, machining and component work: frames, brackets, machined parts, weldments and sub-assemblies. These shops run welding power supplies, positioners, presses and machining centers, and they consume the same families of cable as the car builder, in smaller quantities.
The Canisteo River runs through the middle of this, and the valley floor is narrow. Industrial sites are packed along it, which is why yard space is tight, why material is often stored outdoors and stacked, and why a collection has to be planned around a narrow approach rather than a wide open gate.
Where the surplus cable comes from
Welding cable is the signature of a Hornell lot. Shops replace leads when the jacket is worn through, when a station is relocated or when a welding power supply is upgraded, and the retired lead is heavy, copper-rich and usually still serviceable along part of its length. It comes in coils and on short reels, in sizes from the small diameters used at a bench to the heavy leads used on a positioner.
The second source is fabrication equipment. A press, a shear, a plasma table or a crane is replaced and its feeder, control and pendant cable come out with it. Overhead crane and hoist cable is a category of its own: festoon and flat cable, trolley cable and the trailing cable that runs on a moving bridge, all of which wear in a recognisable way.
Third comes the ordinary shop surplus — part reels of 600 V feeder, motor lead cable, control cable and machine tool wire from a relocation or a reorganisation — and fourth, the contractor work that follows any industrial town: building alterations, lighting replacements and service upgrades that leave part reels behind. Where a shop building is being stripped, cable is removed as recovery material by the owner's contractor with the supply isolated and confirmed dead first.
- Rail car and transit assembly shops
- Heavy fabrication and weldment suppliers
- Machine shops and component manufacturers
- Crane, press and material handling equipment replacements
- Building alterations and shop clearances in the older blocks
Getting a heavy lot out of a narrow valley
Hornell is not hard to reach. I-86 passes just outside town, NY-36 runs north–south through the valley and NY-21 heads east toward the lakes. The last half mile is the interesting part: older shop buildings sit close to the street, some doors were sized for rail cars and not for vans, and a loaded trailer may have nowhere to turn around.
Winter is a real scheduling factor at this latitude and elevation, and it combines badly with outdoor storage. Reels standing in a yard through a thaw and a refreeze can be frozen to the ground and wrapped in ice; a February collection may need a day's notice to free them. Roofed or tarpaulin-covered stacks are much easier and are valued accordingly.
Send photographs of the reels, the door and the approach, and tell us what lifting equipment is on site. In a valley like this the vehicle choice decides whether the pickup takes two hours or a whole day.
Specification
What a buyer needs to know about this cable
Every row below changes what a lot is worth. If the reel tag is gone, the jacket print and a cut end usually answer most of it.
Missing detail is not a problem — say what is missing and the review works from photographs.
| County | Steuben County, Southern Tier |
|---|---|
| Cable-generating industry | Rail car and transit manufacturing, welding and heavy fabrication, machining and components |
| Dominant cable families | Welding cable, heavy feeder and bus, crane and hoist cable, control and machine tool cable |
| Typical lot sizes | Pallet to several pallets; fabrication clearances run heavier than machine shop lots |
| Freight | I-86 exit west of town, NY-36 north–south, NY-21 east toward the lakes; rail served industrial track |
| Access notes | Canisteo River valley limits yard space, steep side streets, older shop doors, heavy winter |
Constructions
Cable families Hornell lots usually contain
Welding dominates, but a rail car shop leaves more than welding lead.
Welding lead and ground cable
Welding cable in coils and on short reels, from bench sizes to heavy positioner leads, plus ground cable, electrode holders and the spliced lengths that accumulate in any fabrication shop.
Crane and hoist
Festoon and flat cable, trolley and bridge conductor, pendant and control cable from overhead cranes — a family that wears predictably and is replaced in complete runs.
Heavy feeder and bus
Large feeder to presses, shears, plasma tables and welding banks, plus bus and jumpers where a shop distributes power overhead.
Machine tool and control
Motor lead and VFD cable, machine tool wire, tray and control cable, encoder and feedback runs from machining centers and assembly cells.
Seller questions
Hornell questions
Do you buy used welding cable?
Yes, and it is one of the most common lots in this part of Steuben County. It is assessed on conductor size, jacket condition and how much of the length is sound, since a lead that has been dragged and pinched for years is not the same as one retired from a bench.
Can you collect from a shop with no yard and no turning space?
Often, using a shorter vehicle or a flatbed with a lift, and loading from the street side within whatever the street allows. Tell us the door dimensions and the approach; if a trailer cannot get in, we would rather know before dispatch than after.
What about cable from a crane or hoist replacement?
It is worth collecting where the runs came out complete. Festoon and trolley cable is replaced as a set, so the surplus tends to be matched lengths rather than odds and ends, which makes it easier to identify and easier to value.
Is cable stored outdoors through the winter still acceptable?
It can be, if the wrap held and the ends were sealed. Reels that have stood in ice and standing water are inspected before valuation, and any length with water in the bedding is treated as suspect regardless of the tag.
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Selling cable in Hornell?
Local access notes are the difference between a smooth pickup and a wasted morning. Tell us the street, the dock and the gate.
Hornell lot details
A buyer reviews it and replies with the questions that matter.
Prefer to talk? 614-715-3047 · saleselectricalbuyers@gmail.com