It would seem my request has stirred a bit of discussion. That's good!
Just to clarify, the type reel I am after is the one for the standard 116/616 film length, not the wider one with the longer spiral. There is still a small question of whether I need not just the reel, but a tank too. Does the standard stainless steel 120 tank work for these? I assumed so, and actually just made a quick measurement to insure my tanks can accommodate the extra height of the taller reel (it would seem they can). Of course I am assuming the reel diameter is basically the same on these as 120, 127, and 35mm sizes, but maybe I should find that out for sure.
It is really hard to get a reference point on the price here. I saw the one on eBay a while back with the BIN price of $75. I think that there was also a long-roll type 70mm reel and tank that went for $41 (again, not what I want but maybe useful for comparison). This seems pretty high given that good used 120 reels sometimes go for as little as a few bucks these days. But I suppose the relative scarcity of the 116 size reels comes into play here. In any event, Stone I am sending you a PM with an offer. Hopefully it won't be too insulting!
My history with this may be instructive for the others who are looking. Originally, I purchased an old-style Paterson Universal tank that comes with a plastic reel expandable to 116 size. The tank itself is a real beauty, made of bakelite I think. But I can vouch for what was said earlier about these, that they cannot be inverted (they will leak), and are designed for the twirl stick agitation approach instead. Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but I am just used to inversion. The second thing I discovered is that this one takes quite a long time to empty through it's little spout - significantly longer than even my stainless steel tanks. So something to think about. Yet another issue is the fact that the plastic reel is wider than my stainless steel ones. This wouldn't be a problem in and of itself, but I have become quite fond of drying my rolls with a Senrac Rapid Roll Film Dryer, and it only accepts stainless steel reels. I eventually got the idea of fabricating an extension tube for the Senrac so that if I ever HAD to, I could also dry plastic reels; but the other issues with the old tank were enough for me to seek a different solution.
My second effort was to purchase a more modern Paterson tank system, and then modify the reels to accommodate the taller film. For what it's worth, I DID play around with the idea that you can stack the reel halves in a certain way and get the correct spacing without having to do any modification of the reels. And, yes, that does work! But it didn't seem especially secure to me when assembled that way. In the end, I decided to permanently bond two reel halves together, and thus turn them into a single dedicated 116 reel. This basically worked as it was supposed to - it fits the film size correctly, the reel still ratchets and all, and it should be usable for any one who normally likes plastic reels. But I had problems with using it. Granted, part of that is just me and my relative inexperience with plastic (being a stainless steel fan). But some of it was the extra width of the 116 film (compared to 120) which I think makes it a little harder to work with. Most importantly though, the characteristics of the found film I am usually working with seems to make life more difficult too. These old rolls tend to be more brittle, and also tend to have quite a bit if curl, or "set" from having been on a spool for so long. It just seemed like a real pain to get the old film to load properly, making it's way over the bearings, and smoothly around the spiral without incident. So that's where I am with this - looking for a stainless steel reel. If I ever obtain one, I think I may just give away the modified plastic reel I built (for the cost of shipping), if anyone wants it.
Jeff