By mounting your own stamps you can save lots of money. You still need to buy your foam and wood blocks but you don't have to pay someone to mount and index them. One of the things you need is a good pair of scissors. KAI brand are highly recommended for cutting rubber and foam. When you are going to be cutting through a "sticky" foam coat you scissors with embossing ink and it won't gum up as quickly. When they do gum up use "Un-Du" or "Goo Gone" to remove the adhesive from your scissors. Another new tool for cutting that I found in my husband garage is his scroll saw. I mount my rubber onto the sticky foam and then cut around the images. I can get in tight spots and cut real close. When the blade seems to gum up I just toss it and start with a fresh blade. This goes really fast and a lot easier on the hands. The next item you will need is foam. You can get a WIDE variety of products. It comes in different thicknesses. No adhesive, sticky one side, and sticky two sides. It even comes in different densities. Your best bet is to look at the stamps you love and see what kind of foam they used. If you pick a foam with no adhesive, the best luck I have had using it, is to use rubber cement. Coat each side of the piece you want to stick together. Give it a minute or two to set up then stick together. It gives it a really strong bond. Then when mounting it to the wood I use 3M spray adhesive. The rubber is the next component. There are a lot of manufactures that offer their images unmounted. You may want to take a look at this site, www.littlebit.com . They have a listing of companies that sell unmounted rubber dies. Mounting Your Stamps Your first step is to trim your rubber. There is no industry standard on how you'll receive your rubber when you buy it. You may get a perfect die already mounted on foam. Then again you may get a partial sheet of rubber with a couple images that need to be cut out. You need to trim the rubber as close to the edges of the image as possible. Be careful not to cut into the sides of the image, these "hills" support the image. This trimming ensures that you don't get those "extra" inking lines when you stamp. I then clean the back of the rubber with rubbing alcohol. This removes all of the dirt, dust and grease that may have accumulated on the back during processing or the millions of hands that touched it during the convention when you bought it. Wipe it on then let it dry. It only take a few seconds for it to evaporate. Then lay the cut out rubber pieces on your sticky foam. Then trim the foam around the image. Make sure not to undercut the foam. Your rubber has to be fully covered on the bottom with the foam. What I do next is stamp my index. You will get ink on your hands. I like to use Memories permanent ink. I take the mount and stamp the image on the top of the wood. Then all you have left to do is peel the paper off the other side and stick it on you block. To order the right size wood block measure your die and add an 1/8" to 1/4" to each side. This should give you a rough idea what size wood blocks you need. Example: Die measures 13/4" x 2 1/2". Add 1/4" to each side. 2" x 2 3/4". So I would order the 2" width in 2 3/4" of length. Here is another site with GREAT instructions on mounting your stamps. |
Mounting |
By mounting your own stamps you can save lots of money. You still need to buy your foam and wood blocks but you don't have to pay someone to mount and index them. One of the things you need is a good pair of scissors. KAI brand are highly recommended for cutting rubber and foam. When you are going to be cutting through a "sticky" foam coat you scissors with embossing ink and it won't gum up as quickly. When they do gum up use "Un-Du" or "Goo Gone" to remove the adhesive from your scissors. Another new tool for cutting that I found in my husband garage is his scroll saw. I mount my rubber onto the sticky foam and then cut around the images. I can get in tight spots and cut real close. When the blade seems to gum up I just toss it and start with a fresh blade. This goes really fast and a lot easier on the hands. The next item you will need is foam. You can get a WIDE variety of products. It comes in different thicknesses. No adhesive, sticky one side, and sticky two sides. It even comes in different densities. Your best bet is to look at the stamps you love and see what kind of foam they used. If you pick a foam with no adhesive, the best luck I have had using it, is to use rubber cement. Coat each side of the piece you want to stick together. Give it a minute or two to set up then stick together. It gives it a really strong bond. Then when mounting it to the wood I use 3M spray adhesive. The rubber is the next component. There are a lot of manufactures that offer their images unmounted. You may want to take a look at this site, www.littlebit.com . They have a listing of companies that sell unmounted rubber dies. Mounting Your Stamps Your first step is to trim your rubber. There is no industry standard on how you'll receive your rubber when you buy it. You may get a perfect die already mounted on foam. Then again you may get a partial sheet of rubber with a couple images that need to be cut out. You need to trim the rubber as close to the edges of the image as possible. Be careful not to cut into the sides of the image, these "hills" support the image. This trimming ensures that you don't get those "extra" inking lines when you stamp. I then clean the back of the rubber with rubbing alcohol. This removes all of the dirt, dust and grease that may have accumulated on the back during processing or the millions of hands that touched it during the convention when you bought it. Wipe it on then let it dry. It only take a few seconds for it to evaporate. Then lay the cut out rubber pieces on your sticky foam. Then trim the foam around the image. Make sure not to undercut the foam. Your rubber has to be fully covered on the bottom with the foam. What I do next is stamp my index. You will get ink on your hands. I like to use Memories permanent ink. I take the mount and stamp the image on the top of the wood. Then all you have left to do is peel the paper off the other side and stick it on you block. To order the right size wood block measure your die and add an 1/8" to 1/4" to each side. This should give you a rough idea what size wood blocks you need. Example: Die measures 13/4" x 2 1/2". Add 1/4" to each side. 2" x 2 3/4". So I would order the 2" width in 2 3/4" of length. Here is another site with GREAT instructions on mounting your stamps. |
