Review on 1/2" 55Ft XHF 3:1 Waterproof Adhesive Lined Heat Shrink Tubing Roll Marine Grade Insulation Sealing Oil-Proof Wear-Resistant Black by Matthew Peterson

My True treadmill front roller is small diameter (1.75") and had a plastic sleeve on it to increase friction for advancing the belt. In time, this sleeve split and bunched up causing an annoying sound when using the treadmill. The fix for this is to remove the remnant plastic sleeve, clean the roller and cover it with a piece of shrink tube. The 2" variety of XHF tube was selected and delivered in one day by Best Buy. A heat gun was sufficient to shrink the tube onto the treadmill roller, although not without a few small ripples in the finished job. After reassembly with the shrink tube covered roller the treadmill is operating perfectly and much quieter than before. The XHF shrink tube worked well for this application and I am very satisfied with the result at low cost.The small ripples noted in the result appear to have no effect on treadmill operation but it would be a neater job without them. Here are some ideas that might help reduce the likelihood of a wrinkle: the shrink tube is delivered flat - introducing creases midway between the existing creases might help the shrink tube fit more uniformly around the roller prior to shrinkage; shrink the tube a little bit at a time over its entire length rather starting in the middle as I did and shrinking that section down tight before moving toward the ends.Edit 1/11/2020The treadmill developed an annoying sticky-flappy sound again after nine months of quiet. The sleeve previously applied on the treadmill roller with the heat shrink tube was loose and would easily slide up and down the roller - a snug fit still, but no longer fixed tightly to the roller (so much for the ‘adhesive’ properties this heat shrink tubing is supposed to have). This small space between tube and roller must be the cause of the noise. (I missed a trick here: I should have tried to affix the sleeve again by applying heat). I tried unsuccessfully to use shrink tube of initial diameter 1.75 but could not get it on the roller more than a few inches before friction got too great to pull it on further. So back to the original 2” shrink tube. Luckily the length of the roller was less than 24" so I had plenty left over from the initial four foot section to make another roller cover. I sanded the surface of the treadmill roller to make it rougher and cleaned it well with isopropyl alcohol. I tried flattening the tube to set a crease halfway from the initial crease in the using piles of books; that didn't really do much to add a new permanent crease. I did change my shrinking technique a little: starting at one end I concentrated on first shrinking the portions of tube that stuck out most from the roller (caused by the crease from the flattened tubing). After shrinking those portions on opposite sides of the roller, I applied heat to the area in between. By this method I was able to shrink the tube on the roller with practically no remaining ripples or bumps; a big improvement over the first attempt. I used a Dewalt heat gun at 400 degrees F for shrinking and the process took about twenty minutes. This sort of tubing is supposed to shrink at around 210 F but it would be an incredibly slow process. I toyed with the idea of ‘curing’ the tubing even more in my kitchen over but caution won out: one end of the roller has a ridged end cap pressed on for the drive belt pulley and this cap appeared to be made from plastic. I would be majorly sad if the oven curing melted or deformed that cap. So that should be it. Hopefully I won’t be writing about attempt number three in the near future.