UKC

Every time I cut my rope and use a lighter on the end to seal it, it always ends up looking bad and eventually fraying anyway. 

I notice that new ropes come with shrink wrapped ends... has anyone got any experience fitting something like this? Or got any other solutions? I did think of using electrical tape, but glue always seeps out and gets tacky over time when I use it on hardware.

I did also find these 'heat shrinkable' rope ends, used for marine purposes (https://www.sheridanmarine.com/product/heat-shrink-rope-ends#:~:text=Heat%2....) Anyone used these before?

Thanks all! 

Tape it really tight before you cut it. Then cut through the tape. Since it's pretaped the end doesn't fray. Then singe the end off. It's better if you have a hot steel plate rather than a lighter. 

I haven't used those, but what I do is I get a hot knife, cut the rope then while it's still hot I roll the end on the side of the blade, slightly melting and binding the sheath there. It seems to work, none of the ropes I've done this too have frayed ends. 

Heat an old knife up with a gas stove or blow torch.

Lay the rope tight on a piece of spare  timber and let the knife melt through.

Any sharp edge can be smoothed down with the side of the knife.

Shrink wrap or tape can catch pulling the rope on abseils.

This. 

That's just bog standard heat shrink tubing.  You don't need it, but if you want to buy it in a very small quantity you're probably better off having a look on ebay.  Available in all sorts of colours, and clear, with or without an adhesive lining.  Typically you'll find people on ebay selling about a metre of the stuff for the couple of quid that chandler is charging for 120mm or so. 
(It's very cheap when you buy it in bulk, it's tempting to describe a couple of quid for such a tiny quantity as a rip off, but of course you're not paying for the product you're paying for someone to cut a bit off the roll and send it to you.)

Alternatively you can fuse a bit of the sheath before you cut it.  No tape required.
(Not with a cigarette lighter though, ideally.  It's a poor tool for the job.)

As Rick said, you can get good results by heating an old butter knife up with a blowtorch. I only discovered this after loads of messy knife and cigarette lighter jobs.

I have never got tape of any description to stay on the end for any length of time.

Any shop that sells by the metre, and any climbing wall that uses reels of rope, will have a hot rope knife.  Much better results than the DIY methods.