Printable Srinkwrap.

[Keithmac]

May be old hat to some but I thought I'd post this up as there seems to be a lot of project cars been built.

I do a lot of one off looms and it gets tricky to remember how stuff is wired (always make notes for later).

Was looking for an easy way to make the wiring more I intuitive and finally bit the bullet and bought this.

Its a Dymo Rhino Pro 5000. Shrink wrap cartridges of various diameter are widely available.

Just used it this morning and it's an excellent bit of kit!. Wish I'd bought one years ago.

 

[barracuda816]

This is one of those things I keep wanting to buy myself but always putting it off. I used to have use of an industrial cable laser etcher.

My concern though is, how does the heat shrink hold up under heat like in an engine bay? They are thermal printers I believe, always makes me think of till recipes that are illegible after a bit of time in the sun. I think they are great for things like network cables but am not convinced they will survive 15-20 years in an engine bay?

 

[Keithmac]

Interesting question!.

They specify shrink temperature between 84c to 124c so I suppose of it can withstand that it should be fine in an engine bay.

 

[daleyd]

I’ve got a brother one - it was a proper industrial type that was for electrical work but it’s pretty old now and supposedly isn’t compatible with heat shrink (don’t think it was around at the time when I bought it about 20 years ago, or not widely available at least) but I got some generic stuff from Amazon and it seems to work ok with it.

I do a fair bit of panel wiring (mainly mods in plc/dcs systems rather than building them from scratch) and it makes a neat job of labelling control wiring, though I tend to fall back to old style push in numbers for smaller jobs. I keep meaning to get hold of some thicker stuff for network cables etc.

 

[jmp49]

I have used a brady id pro with dedicated cable labels that wrap around and adhere to themselves, and cover the printed label bit with a clear section and can be applied post fab in situ, theyre mini ribbon printers made especially for this job.
I must have put 100 reels of a thousand labels on doing one install because the customer specified cable serial marking every metre on every cable and it had 80 47u racks which is a LOT of cables... but I did notice going back after a couple of years the glue was letting go and letting the odd label spring off like weird butterflies. But that was in a server room with high temperatures because the chillers couldn't keep pace.
Equally Ive seen shrinkwrap labels fade to nothing after a few years... Cant remember the brand as someone else applied them but it was a professional one.

 

[Robotstar5]

My old boss wasn't technically minded at all, he would type in the words he wanted then print the label, then, instead of clearing the printer he would type the next words he wanted and press print again so he got the first label again as well as the one he wanted he would repeat the process until he had all the labels he wanted or came and ask for another roll of tape as he had run out!

 

[Robotstar5]

I’ve got a brother one - it was a proper industrial type that was for electrical work but it’s pretty old now and supposedly isn’t compatible with heat shrink (don’t think it was around at the time when I bought it about 20 years ago, or not widely available at least) but I got some generic stuff from Amazon and it seems to work ok with it.

I do a fair bit of panel wiring (mainly mods in plc/dcs systems rather than building them from scratch) and it makes a neat job of labelling control wiring, though I tend to fall back to old style push in numbers for smaller jobs. I keep meaning to get hold of some thicker stuff for network cables etc.

Do you ever use this type?, I never seem to have much luck getting the printed labels in without damage/crumpling

 

[Keithmac]

I was using it to label up some speaker wiring yesterday.

No faffing about setting it up, just type in what you want and it pops out perfectly every time.

 

[knighty]

printable heat shrink.... get yourself on aliexpress and buy the compatible/copy stuff

not sure about your printer but for my brother printer it was a fraction of the price :-)

 

[daleyd]

This is the printer I’ve got and the heat shrink from Amazon.

Finished result.