The thing is, it seems to work fine, I still got to replace the felt the slugs? rest on, they make more noise when they reset than when they hit the platen

Well the heat shrink arrived today, applied 2 layers to my empire Aristocrat platen , and I got to say, initial results, I'm really impressed, though I have now realised that I didn't order a new ribbon, which is now on its way, then we'll see what it types like with a fresh ribbon, I wonder if anyone else out there has a knackered platen fancies giving this a go?

An update on my progress,
    unfortunately the platen off my empire Aristocrat is no more, boo hoo, it softened up nicely, but split when when I inspected it, not sure old pre/post war rubber is upto this treatment, bits broke off you see, so I removed all the old rubber, because of this I've also removed the Oliver platen before my ham-fisted mits damage that too, but all is not lost.
Plan B.
Due to my 'mistake', I have found some rubber heat shrink tube, the type that would be used on tennis racket, bat's, fishing rods and maybe even golf clubs, so some has been purchased and will be fitted when it arrives, only one slight issue is it comes with a slightly raised diamond pattern for grip, so I either sand it off gently or leave it,
Choices eh, I'll keep you posted

Hi all,
         Just thought I'd give an update for anyone who is interested.
          I've removed 3 platens from my silver reed, empire Aristocrat (hermes) and Oliver courier, so all 3 platens of varying ages and rubber quality, they have been soaking in a mixture 4 to 1 rubbing alcohol and wintergreen oil for the last 4 days, now considering all 3 were more like Baker lite, the old post war type plastic, (forgive me if that's the wrong description but that's what I know it as) the hard brittle stuff of old, now there not like fresh brand new rubber like an tyre inner tube, but there is a definite slight improvement at this stage.
           What I didn't do however was give them a gentle rub down with emery paper, so I've taken them out today, dried them off and given them a light rub down with 800 grade, just take the shine off and open up the surface, in hindsight probably should have done this before soaking in the solution, live and learn, so I'm hoping this will make a difference, give it a few more days and we'll see.
            But as I said at this stage there is an improvement as I have a 4th platen still on another typewriter to compare and as I said, definitely a little improvement, if anyone wants to contact me please feel free and I can tell you what I've learnt so far so that you don't make any of the mistakes I made.
Regards
Mark

Peterborough UK