How Do I Get The Best Print On My Heatshrink?
Our proprietary Heatshrink Printing process allows you to select from our available combination of heatshrink products and design your own customized heatshrink tubing. For the best results, please follow the guidelines listed below. These guidelines will reduce the printing time while increasing the quality of your print.
- Provide a high quality JPG image of 300 dpi.
- Provide a black & white version of your image. Our system will convert any color images to black and white and the results may not be what you had intended.
- Download Our Printing Guide as a PDF.
What File Type Do I Need To Upload?
Our Heatshrink Printing interface works best with .JPG files. Please ensure you have saved your file with the highest quality (300dpi). If you need to provide a different file format, please give us a call or contact us via chat.
What Is Shrink Ratio?
The shrink ratio is the approximate maximum amount that heatshrink tubing will shrink relative to the unshrunk diameter.
For example, a piece of 3/4" heatshrink tubing with a 3:1 shrink ratio will shrink down to a maximum diameter of approximately 1/4" when fully shrunk. All heatshrink tubing on our site is specified in its UNSHRUNK diameter, so consider the shrink ratio and the unshrunk diameter when ordering heatshrink tubing.
Heatshrink tubing with a larger shrink ratio will be more forgiving when fitting the tubing over plugs or connectors, but will have a bit thicker wall thickness and slightly less flexibility when shrunk than a lower ratio product.
*Please Note: Only 2:1 and 3:1 are currently available for heatshrink printing.
What Heat Shrink Material Can Be Printed On?
Our current heat shrink printing capabilities currently allow us to be able to print on standard 2:1 and 3:1 Polyolefin heat shrink tubing.
How Do I Determine What Diameter Heat Shrink I Need?
You have to be a bit careful when measuring for heatshrink because - as you may have guessed - heatshrink shrinks! When it comes to picking the proper size heatshrink, two important terms to remember are nominal diameter and shrink ratio.
Nominal diameter is the original or ‘unshrunk’ diameter of a piece of heatshrink. Shrink ratio is the approximate maximum amount that heatshrink will shrink relative to its nominal diameter. For example, heatshrink with a 1/4” nominal diameter and a 2:1 shrink ratio will shrink to a diameter of approximately 1/8”.
Measure the diameter of the cables you’re covering, including any attached connectors. Then, choose a heatshrink option with a nominal diameter greater than the diameter of your cables AND a shrink ratio that will ensure that the post-shrinkage diameter of the heatshrink is smaller than the diameter of your cables.
*Please Note: If you measure your heatshrink flat the diameter will NOT match the size you ordered. To correctly determine the heat shrink diameter measure the width of the flat tubing then multiply the width by 2, and divide this number by Pi (3.1416) to determine the correct nominal diameter.