fixing a damaged roll of magnet wire?? help

[the great waldo]

Hello All

Does anyone have any good tips on how to fix a roll of magnet wire thats had some `damage and there are more than one end of wire coming off it.

Cheers
Andrew

[J M Fahey]

Ouch!!!
Curse the Gods, and unwrap the visible wire ends until you go through the damaged layer and can use the remaining good one.

No magic bullet here, just use good light plus a magnifier or stacked reading glasses.

You won´t be so lucky as to pick ends in proper order, so unwind as much as possible, under light thension (or it will stick), as soon as you feel resistance you pick another end and so on.

And ... good luck
Plus LOTS of patience.

[David King]

Jason Lollar posted something about this years back but that might have been in regards to spools that have been dropped on one end. As i recall his method was to slice off a few layers of wire with a sharp exacto knife and then try to find the true end. It doesn't sound like you are ready for that option yet but it might be a last resort before retiring the spool permanently on eBay.;-)

Here's the thread: https://music-electronics-forum.com/...ad.php?t=15858 post #12
Good luck!

[the great waldo]

I've currsed the gods already, looks like it's going to be a slow wind to find the end. There's probably about 2 kilos of wire still on the spool. Teach me to be a bit more careful in the future.
Cheers.
Andrew

[Timmy!]

I just had to deal with this for the first time two weeks ago. Took me two evenings to sort it, but I got there.

I found the best unwinding method was to hold the spool from the top and gently swirl it around to encourage the loose ends unwind themselves by gravity. Any trapped ends would stay put until they were freed. I kept swirling until only one end remained.

I found that pulling on the ends didn’t work particularly well and felt it caused more damage, prolonging the whole tedious process.

[mozz]

I actually bought 4 or 5 spools of various gauges that were damaged. 40-46awg. Price was very reasonable and it was for some gauges i didn't already have. First was 42.5 and i decided to wind a tele neck pickup with it. Took a while to find the correct end. I kind of rubbed my finger on the wire and moved opposite the way it was wound. I wasted some wire but finally got to the proper layer and it is working fine now. I generally buy wire in 5lb spools to get the best discount. You have to be careful with storage and handling.

[kayakerca]

Could you put the spool on the winder, put on an empty bobbin, pick and end and attach it to the bobbin and then just start a wind? When you reach the other end, pick a new broken end and repeat?

[J M Fahey]

You must be VERY lucky to pick ends in the proper order.
Normal is you pick one and can´t unroll more than 1 or 2 feet.
And once you tension it, it grabs others in a mess.

[Alberto]

Usually, a bit of the end wire sticks out from the base of the spool. If you measure the resistance between your ends and the wire sticking out from the base of the spool you may find the working end. This would be the last one to unwind, I guess.

[the great waldo]

Hi Alberto
That's a good idea, i'll have to see if I can find the start wire, thanks.
Cheers

Andrew

[Lollar Jason]

A friend of mine from OZ told me about this years ago and I have done it many times so it works. Sometimes the "end" of the wire gets buried due to improper spooling or you have a badly damaged spool that looks like a rats nest. Cut all the way down one side of the spool about 1/8" deep as evenly as you can and start pulling off wire. Eventually you wind up with three or four ends and then you are getting close- just keep unravelling all the ends and youll eventually find the one you want.
If you hang the spool in a stairwell you can use gravity to do alot of the work like someone suggested but with wire finer than 38 gauge it takes a good length of wire to have enough weight to unravel itself. This method typically takes about a half hour.

[ZRGuitarPickups]

I buy used, vintage spools on eBay all the time, and pretty much nobody knows how to properly ship this stuff - that being said, I've developed an excellent method for fixing damages spools!

It's weird...

Take a vacumm hose (with a 2" or so nozzle), turn it on a somewhat low power, and then swing it in circles about a foot over your damaged spool. This will 'suck up' all of the loose ends AND in about 5-10 minutes you'll be left with 1 wire that is flying off that spool.

I've done this with some SEVERELY OBLITERATED spools - and it works! Use your hand at first as a guide to help the wire off the spool

This method was developed with 48 AWG wire, and works just as well with 40AWG Heavy

[Lollar Jason]

Nice- thats the place to start!- if you wind up with no end visible then its broken off below the surface so you have to cut it. Happens all the time- improperly spooled at the factory.

[the great waldo]

I buy used, vintage spools on eBay all the time, and pretty much nobody knows how to properly ship this stuff - that being said, I've developed an excellent method for fixing damages spools!

It's weird...

Take a vacumm hose (with a 2" or so nozzle), turn it on a somewhat low power, and then swing it in circles about a foot over your damaged spool. This will 'suck up' all of the loose ends AND in about 5-10 minutes you'll be left with 1 wire that is flying off that spool.

I've done this with some SEVERELY OBLITERATED spools - and it works! Use your hand at first as a guide to help the wire off the spool

This method was developed with 48 AWG wire, and works just as well with 40AWG Heavy

Hi ZR
As i'm the OP good news and I owe you a beer. It's late here and I just thought i'd give your idea a go. It worked perfectly and i've just rescued the best part of 2.4 kgs of 43 awg wire. I started with the vacuum cleaner and was getting about 5 or 6 threads getting sucked up and was on the verge of giving up but continued and pulled up all the ends at a distance from the roll by hand did a bit more with the vacuum and then it suddenly cleared to 1 wire end. Success !! It's nice to have something like this work out as it's a pain chucking out most of a good roll (and not cheap either) of wire. This is what our forum should be all about.

Cheers

Andrew

[ZRGuitarPickups]

might be a last resort before retiring the spool permanently on eBay.;-)

Hah, well actually most of my used spools do say DAVID on the side...