So, one end of one of my pairs of shoelaces has somehow lost its plastic aglet. No biggie - except its the shoelaces of the boots I wear the most and also remove the laces from regularly in order to clean and condition them - and when one then has to lace them up again and has to get the lace-end through all eyelets without an aglet, that's frustrating. So, what to do?
Well, the easy way out is to buy a new pair of shoelaces but there is lots of life left in these so can we be more ambitious and try to fix them? I.e., with something more permanent than a little length of tape? Shrink-tubing comes to mind, but can we find something non-plastic? Yes we can, let's order an assortment of brass tubes meant for making hobby dioramas (which costed about the same as a new pair of boot laces).
It was a challenge to get the bare shoelace end into the tube, but by wrapping the end with a little tape and twisting it, it finally went in long enough.
Then we "just" have to cut the tube with a metal saw - something that didn't really turn perfect. Perhaps a cutter would work better than a saw?
Then, repeat the same operation on the other end - which was easier as the plastic aglet still was present on that end, and I have probably a lot more lasting aglets on my shoelaces that allegedly will get a nice patina with time and wear.
