Poly Welder Pro Polyethylene Welding Strips (5), Red Color, 12" x 1/16" x 3/8"

I use these polyethylene welding strips for kayak repair work, mainly for patching and reinforcing small cracks and wear areas on HDPE plastic. They melt and bond as expected when used with proper plastic welding heat, and they integrate well into the base material once you get the temperature right. The key thing that actually made this work for me was keeping the heat consistent—too hot and you’ll burn or deform the plastic, too cold and it won’t properly fuse. Once you dial that in, the strips flow into the existing material and form a solid bond. It also helps to clean and lightly rough up the repair area first so the weld has something to grip onto. I’ve had the best results applying pressure as the plastic cools to ensure a tight, uniform seal. The strips themselves feed smoothly and are easy to work with during the weld process. They’re flexible enough when heated to shape into cracks and seams without breaking or clumping. Overall, they do exactly what they’re supposed to do for polyethylene repair. If you take your time and use the right heat control, you can get strong, clean repairs that hold up well in real use.

Poly Welder Pro Polyethylene Welding Strips - 5-feet (Black) The product I purchased was the black LDPE strips not the green or white. I have an older motorhome with black low density polyethylene holding tanks for both the black and grey water. The whole key to successfully plastic welding any of these tanks is finding out what the tanks are made of. In most cases the recycling symbol on the tank, usually a triangle with a number, will indicate what it is made of. In order to successfully weld plastic you must use a welding rod of either the same density as the tank, or welding rod of a lower density than the tank. In my case LDPE worked perfectly. Both tanks had stress cracks in multiple places from the metal bars and bolts that were used to bolt the tanks up to the floor of the motorhome. I did not remove the tanks when doing this. Both of these tanks were bone dry when I did the welding. First I tried using a very small triangular shaped iron to do it but it did not get hot enough to melt the plastic to a state of flow. At that point I just grabbed my propane torch, set it to approximately a 0.5 inch or shorter flame and applied it to both the tank and the rod at the same time. You can see the plastic melt both surfaces and they effectively became one solid piece of plastic. Grab the flat welding rod several inches above the end of it and apply a bend to it trying to flatten it out to the surface of the tank. Put the flame right where the 2 surfaces meet and it will become evident that they are melting together. Be light with the flame. If you hold it too long to that area you could melt it more than you need to. This also will become self-evident. You will become better at this type of welding quickly as you do it. The results were phenomenal. No leaks at all. Tested by filling both tanks up with water as the motorhome sat on our concrete driveway. The additional material that I added to the tanks seemed to increase the strength of the tank by making the tank thicker in that area. I don't anticipate ever having to do this again. It sure worked like a charm.

I've used these a lot for repairing cracks and reinforcing the fenders and other body panels on my 1985 Honda Big Red three-wheeler. They work great with standard plastic welders, hot staplers, and even soldering irons if you know how to do it properly. If done correctly you can make a 30 or 40 year old piece look great again. When the time comes I'll definitely get more of these. I highly recommend grabbing some of these and learning the art of plastic welding. It's rewarding and saves a lot of expense.

Silly expensive for what you get but, a pure and effective solution for polyethylene repairs. I had a Honda gas tank that just cracked due to age. A new OEM tank was unobtainable and an aftermarket tank was white and $150. This poly material was almost identical in color to the OEM Honda tank and, after using some metal binding staples to stabilize the crack, this material closed the gap and stopped the leaks.

I am hard on my sit on top kayaks, dragging them across gravel, nailheads on decks, etc. The keel on one of them was gauged open by a nail head, and I tried everything to fix it. Plastic epoxy impregnating fibeglass cloth---it peeled off. 3M super adhesive that sticks to everything, with fiberglass cloth---it began to peel off at edges with light use. Nothing would stick once the kayak hit the rocks and sand. I bought the green plastic welding sticks and a heat gun. When you heat the plastic, first, the crack opens bigger and the plastic begins to deform a bit. But it doesn't look anything like liquid, so you are doubtful that it can stick securely to the welding sticks. And when you heat the plastic welding strip, it begins to droop but it also does not resemble liquid, so it seems doubtful that it will stick. You lay the strip across the crack, and at first the crack just seems to get wider as the plastic heats up. So you end up laying three strips across a crack that you thought would be covered by one strip. And you can't melt it completely smooth, because the shape of the boat begins to warp. I just licked a spoon so it wouldn't stick to the plastic, and smoothed it down a bit with the back of the spoon. I stopped before making a liquid mess of everything, deciding to test it before trying to get it any hotter. Thankfully, it seemed very secure once it cooled off, and I took it out to the beach and dragged it across the road three times, across the beach, and took it through the surf several times. It shows no signs of pulling loose, and it holds water. This is the first time for a very long time that my sit on top kayak did not take on water when going through the surf (silicone caulk in all the rivets also helped). If I was obsessive compulsive, I would file down the welding job so it was smooth and flush. But if you are obsessive compulsive, you will probably mess up the repair. Just let it be a little ugly, and it seems to hold just fine. Finally, I found something that repaired my kayak, and did not peel off. UPDATE TWO YEARS LATER. THIS REPAIR EVENTUALLY PEELED OFF ON SOME ROCKS. But I'm not changing my rating becuase my technique was wrong. Next I bough a small soldering iron-like device with a flat head on it that is designed for heating and shaping this material. It worked to truly fix the kayak for good. But at the same time I bought the iron, I also bought a kit that had these plastic repair sticks WITH some aluminum mesh to embed in the repair. I put the mesh inside the kayak, inside the repair, for stability. And I was more bold with the melting everything together. It seems to be holding. But you need an iron and some mesh to do it right.

Used it to patch holed in a kayak and now its water tight.

The color was way lighter than pictured and the stuff melts kind of weird compared to other Polyethylene i've dealt with but I got it to work so I can't be to mad even if it's way off on color.

Worked on a clear poly water tank. Used a small butane micro torch (it was slightly breezy that day so that didn't help) for heat as it was the only thing I had handy. That wasn't the best option as I think a hot air heat gun with maybe a tin foil made "nozzle" to make a smaller stream of air would have worked better. Clean up and possibly bevel the crack. Put some heat on the piece to be repaired and slightly towards the strip, it will turn slightly clear as it reaches the right temp. Lay the strip in the area to be repaired and work your way along... The plastic will retain a lot of heat so be careful not to overheat. Did what I needed and made a $250 poly tank usable for rain water collection for less than $5 in materials.