SELL SURPLUS XHHW AND XHHW-2 WIRE

XHHW is cross-linked polyethylene insulated building wire, rated 90°C in both dry and wet locations. That wet rating is why it turns up in conduit runs that leave conditioned space: service laterals, underground duct banks, rooftop feeders, mechanical rooms and plant power distribution. It is made in copper and aluminum from #14 through 1000 kcmil, and most of what is sold today is dual-marked XHHW-2/THHN-2, so one reel covers two specifications.

Surplus accumulates because feeders are ordered a reel size up. A crew pulls 340 ft of 350 kcmil from a 500 ft reel and the remainder goes back to the shop. A plant replaces a chiller feeder and the spare reel never gets touched. A distributor drops a slow-moving size. Small quantities are normal, and whole pallets appear when a project is value-engineered or shelved.

What we buy

• XHHW and XHHW-2 — XLPE insulated, 90°C dry and wet, 600V, copper and aluminum.
• Dual-rated XHHW-2/THHN-2 — the most common current construction and the easiest to place with another contractor.
• 2kV jackets — industrial XHHW rated above 600V, usually in plant distribution sizes.
• Sizes #14 through 1000 kcmil — solid and stranded copper, compact and compressed stranded aluminum.
• Feeder and service sizes — 1/0 through 750 kcmil aluminum, the material most often left from panel and switchboard work.
• Colours and neutrals — black, red, blue, white, green, brown, orange, yellow, grey and tracer-marked neutrals.

How to read an XHHW reel

The jacket legend carries almost everything: type, size, voltage class, temperature rating, metal and often the standard the wire was made to. Photograph that print and the reel tag together and the review usually moves in one step.

Condition and length

XLPE handles storage better than thermoplastic insulation. What hurts XHHW is water inside the wrap, ultraviolet exposure on the outer layer, and crushed wraps from a fork truck. A reel that spent a year in a dry connex is usually fine. A reel that sat in a puddle is a different conversation.

• Factory reels with the tag intact and the print still legible
• Partial reels with a tagged or measured remainder over roughly 100 ft
• Pallets of mixed sizes from one job closeout or a closed shop
• Aluminum feeder reels in 1/0 through 750 kcmil
• Sealed cartons of coiled cut lengths from distributor stock

Short tails, jacket that has gone chalky and cracked through, reels with standing water in the wrap and conductor with no readable marking are usually declined. Send the whole lot anyway when most of it is good. We review item by item and tell you which reels we want.

What to photograph

1. Each reel face, so the flange and the remaining wrap are both visible.
2. The jacket legend, shot flat, with type, size and voltage readable.
3. The tag or label, including any footage marking and the manufacturer.
4. The cut end, showing metal, stranding and conductor colour.
5. The storage area, so we can see whether the reels sat indoors or outdoors.

XHHW surplus in Washington, DC and Maryland

In the District, XHHW mostly comes out of institutional and commercial work: service upgrades in older buildings, mechanical room rewiring, rooftop unit feeders, and underground runs through downtown vaults where the pull was measured long and ordered longer. Contractors working from small shops in Northwest and Northeast DC tend to hold a few partial feeder reels between jobs.

Maryland brings the industrial side. Water and wastewater plants, pump stations, food processing lines and manufacturing operations around Baltimore, Frederick and Hagerstown run large aluminum feeders on 600V systems and keep spare reels for maintenance. When a line is reconfigured or a motor control center is replaced, those spares leave stock. Distributors in Prince George’s and Howard counties also clear slow-moving sizes at the end of a season, often still banded.