OH CRAP i said out loud, what have I done my sweet pea? I felt so bad i almost cried... but today i had the day off so off i went to the hardware store and grabbed a cheap soldering iron with a 400°C max capacity. Good enough i thought as i've been told that TPE melts in the high 250°C range.Below is the test tpe piece that i used to try it on before doing the real repair, and as you can see it went fairly well... the finish isn't exactly perfect but at least the material fuses very well together this way. Once powdered it looks kind of like an old scar.
Here is what i did:
WARNING: Only attempt this in a well ventilated room and wear adequate protection! Melting TPE produces toxic fumes!
With the soldering iron, lightly touch the inside of the wound, until it reaches a high enough temperature, once the TPE starts liquifying, it will produce light smoke and turn liquid VERY FAST so be very gentle with the soldering iron. The material also tends to shrink as it liquifies so be wary of that.
Work your way from the inside of the wound towards the edge and fuse the two halves together. at this point the wound will be closed but the surface will look like crap.
Next use the side of the soldering iron's tip and lightly rub it on the scar to make it fuse together and make the surface as even as possible. If done right, the wound will be completely closed from the inside out, and once cooled, it's pretty durable.
I then tried to see how strong the weld was and pulled on it pretty hard and it held up very well.
It will not be as durable as before however, and with a considerable amount of effort, maybe 2 min of constant pulling and stretching pretty hard i was able to open up the test piece again. The good news is that the two halves opened like they were before, with no additional damage, so they can definitely be welded again should this occur over time.
See below posts for pictures of the repair itself with descriptions... i would say it turned out pretty good! I wouldnt recommend trying this on a large tear however, but for small ones like finger pokes, it definitely works!
I'll probably update this in a few weeks to let you all know how it's holding up.
