The Art of Stamping
Care & Maintenance of Ink Pads
Ink pads are expensive, so you'll want to maximize their useful life with proper care and maintenance. Below is a collection of suggestions and tips you might find useful.
George, caught red-handed, as it were, sneaking off work in order to letterbox
- Storage: Traditionally, everyone suggests ink pads should be stored upside-down so the ink will settle near the surface of the pad. I'll go out on a limb and suggest storing your ink pads based on where you want the ink to pool. Especially with new pigment ink pads, the pad is so saturated with ink you'll likely end up with too much ink on the stamp, so you'd rather pull the ink away from the surface. As the ink begins to run dry, storing the pad upside-down will help keep the ink flowing. Markers, as conventional wisdom goes, should be stored horizontally so the ink can spread out evenly, but personally, I'd store it wherever the ink was most needed. When the pen is new, store the tip face-up to get the excess ink away from the tip. When the pen is old, store the tip face-down to get any extra ink to the tip.
- Mixing Colors: To keep the color of your ink pads bright and looking good, try to avoid mixing other colors with them. Clean a dirty stamp before inking up, and even then it may be a good idea to use the same or similar color as the previous person used. A dark green on a dark blue is much less noticeable than a dark green on yellow or other high contrast color combinations.
- Cleaning Ink Pads: In a careless moment of stupidity, you've gotten an ink pad dirty with another color. Panic? No! Try cleaning the ink pad first. Take two paper towels, and soak one of them in water. Put it over the ink pad and press lightly to get out the bad color. Then repeat with the dry paper towel. If that doesn't work, well, then you can panic.
- Ink Pad Repairs: If you use an ink pad long enough, it's bound to happen: The ink pad will start separating from its base. Dauber Duos in particular are infamous for having ink pads that separate from the base. Put a drop or two of super glue on the base where the ink pad has separated from, put the ink pad back in place, and allow the super glue to dry before using the ink pad again.
- Reinking: If, despite all your best efforts, your ink pads no longer stamp well due to lack of ink, instead of replacing the ink pad, consider buying an ink bottle and replace the ink. Spread the ink evenly across the ink pad with the tip of the ink bottle.
With proper care and maintenance, your ink pads can give you years of reliable service.