Flexible toroidal reel

Abstract

A reel or spool comprises of a long flexible split cylindrical channel joined end to end to form a hollow toroidal reel with the slit on its circumference open to accept wound material. The resulting reel or spool is used to store, transport, receive or dispense linear flexible materials such as wire, hose, cord, or chain which lend themselves to being wound helically and/or over themselves. The spool's main purpose is to provide inexpensive, robust, lightweight, flexible, rapidly windable, easily carriable, wall hangable, easily manufacturable, single piece, easily recyclable, compact and secure containment of the wound material while preventing external damage, destructive bending, kinking, flattening or tangling of the material and allowing controllable winding and unwinding of said material. The channel can be made of a lengthwise split flexible tube, a formed sheet of plastic or preferably from single split corrugated plastic drainage pipe. The ends can be joined with a sleeve coupling, welded, riveted, stapled or glued. Being of a single piece construction, there are no flanges or joints to break and the reel is free to expand and evenly distribute forces exerted by the wound material. Different size reels are easily manufacturable from different size pipes or different pipe lengths without re-design, re-molding or re-tooling. The opening on the reel can be oriented anywhere on the reel's circumference at the time of manufacture simply by curving the pipe along a different line.

1 . In accordance with the objectives of the present invention, the invention comprises of a long flexible split cylindrical channel joined end to end to form a hollow toroidal reel with the slit anywhere on its circumference open to accept wound material.  
   
   
       2 . A reel as defined in  claim 1 , wherein the split cylindrical channel is made of lengths of standard plastic corrugated drainage pipe welded, glued, riveted or stapled end to end to form a hollow toroidal reel with the slit anywhere on its circumference open to accept wound material.  
   
   
       3 . A reel as defined in  claim 1 , wherein the split cylindrical channel is made of lengths of standard plastic corrugated drainage pipe joined end to end by two or more coupling sleeves sliding, straddling and crimping the ribs at each end of the pipe to form a hollow toroidal reel with the slit anywhere on its circumference open to accept wound material.  
   
   
       4 . A sleeve which holds the two ends of a split corrugated pipe against each other by sliding over and fastening the two end ribs of the pipe to form a hollow toroidal reel with the slit anywhere on its circumference open to accept wound material.