For quite some time, there have been crooked dealings in the annual Houston Plumbers Fishing Tournament.
Everyone knows it happens. The gentlemen running the show couldnāt figure out how to put a stop to it based on the way that the fish count was tallied. Hard to believe, but fishermen tend to stretch the truth a little (gasp!) and although it seems like a small enough thing, there might have been one group that was winning a little too consistently, if you know what I mean.
But there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth at the planning meeting tomorrow night. A Rule Change is comingā¦and one of the planners has a wife with a Glowforge. Bwahahahahah!
Simple plan - each boat will be handed one large heavy plastic bag, stamped with the official stamp for the day, and the fishermen can put their 25 largest fish in the bag to be turned in all at once, measured in total, and the bags collected and disposed of. Since they will not have the official stamp, itās going to cut down on the cheating and make things fair for everyone this year. (Also avoids the whole game warden cracking down on the Tournament organizersā¦ although most of the guys are honest, there have been a few who fish over the limit.)
Anywayā¦itās a simple enough stampā¦but I wanted to post it here in the Made on a Glowforge section to alert new users to the fact that they can make their own custom stamps, in case they hadnāt thought of it. Itās incredibly easy, the art polymer didnāt stink at all, and if you are interested in making your own - you need to check out @cynd11ās post belowā¦it has all the links to the materials and the settings needed to do them.
I rarely get it right the first timeā¦but following her instructionsā¦I nailed it in one pass.
Yeahā¦I showed it to DH, who was so excited, he wants custom stamps made up for all his customersā¦I have GOT to stop showing him what this thing can do!
Well, itās his tournament, so i kind of had to in this case. (Probably shouldnāt have suggested it - but he was going to hand write it on 180 bags for the tournamentā¦that just didnāt seem like a good idea.)
Hey, Iāve got a question for you stamping expertsā¦weāre having to use this thick heavy duty ink to stick on the plastic bags, and it smears a littleā¦is there a trick to stamping? Like tap it down, or drop it and then carefully pick it up? (Definitely a neophyte.)
It will stick to a thick piece of acrylic, to give you better control. Iām picturing bags sliding ā¦ maybe a way to hold down two sides while you stamp?
With it mounted you can run your hand over the acrylic to get a good coverage from your ink. Which also helps to stabilize the stamp.
Yeah, we got a block for it, but the stamp pad has a little lip on it that the block hits on, so the stamp wasnāt picking up the ink everywhere. (Fixed it with some 1/8" acrylic from my stash, but the plastic is really slick and it still slides a little.)
Itās probably just going to take practiceā¦which unfortunately, with 180 of these things to do, weāre going to get plenty of.
With the stamp clean, you should be able to get the back of the polymer to attach to the acrylic. For very large stamps, you use the ink by laying your stamp face side up, and then pressing the ink pad onto it. Easier to adhere.
When we use the Misti to stamp ā¦ itās basically a large piece of acrylic on a hinge, you lay that back (stamp side up), press your ink on, lay your paper (or bag in your case) on the bottom, and close the hinge onto it. Then you press on the acrylic to get a clear stamp. If it doesnāt adhere well, you have the ability to restamp it.
Maybe you could think of an alternative to that to aid you. Wish I could think of something. That is a lot to stamp!
Itās great to have another stamper on board. Nice job on that!
Youāll have an easier time if you trim the stamp with scissors so there is just about 1/8ā around all the stamping parts. Iām guessing you are using Stazon for its ability to dry on plastic, and it is indeed sticky and hard to work with. After tapping the stamp pad multiple times on the stamp until it looks like coverage is even, try to press down the stamp firmly and evenly, then lift straight up. And something to hold the bag tight, as @ptodd suggests.
Thanks, hubby came up with thatā¦heās very clever.
(And they re going to expel him from the club tonight when he shows them the plan. No cheating? It will be changing a sacred way of life! )
Thanks for the tips ladies! It gives me a couple of ideas for a frame type jig that might work to stabilize the plastic, and weāll definitely flip the pad over.
