Home Made Reel

You can easily make a home made reel; many reels are made everyday using re-bar and other materials readily available. Not long ago I come across a carpenter unrolling air hose across a road. He had to string both electrical cord and air hose about 70 yards. He built a reel using a wooden spool and a tripod re-bar frame with a re-bar base which was light weight but still super strong. He used a piece of flat metal about 8 inches long with a shaft and a piece of plastic pipe to act as the crank to make his home made reel.

It also had a 2 inch hole drilled in the side of the wooden spool which he left about 3 feet of hose stick out the hole so when it was strung out he could plug it into the compressor without unrolling all of the hose. It also had two small wheels on one end for transporting. I found it worked great other than every time the reel turned the piece of hose sticking out of the spool hit on the frame.

Another unique reel I saw in a mechanic shop was built with a pipe and two disks he rigged it so the hole traveled through the pipe allowing you to reel or unreel and not have to unplug the hose every time you wanted to roll or unroll. He said it worked good for first couple of weeks but soon began to leak air at the fittings causing the air compressor to run the whole time. I often take pictures as I am interesting in the kinds of scraps people can use to create a working home made reel.