Plate making problems

The most common problem of all is that the negative is not made dark enough. You will see this as a stamp that has a grainy high floor with no depth of relief.

Then there are just stamp exposing problems:

i) Over-exposure which means too much light and you will see this as a solid stamp or your text being blurred. Take care that the negative that you have used is not too small and light is coming around the side of it and over-exposing the stamp. It is safer to entirely black-off around a negative.

ii) Under-exposure which means too little light and you will see this as a liquid stamp or that part of your stamp falls away in the washing process.

In addition to this you can fail to wash a stamp out properly which will give an unattractive plate with lines on it where the liquid that should have been removed has hardened in the post exposure or final hardening.

If you fail to harden the stamp under water for long enough it will be soft, susceptible to damage later on and may be sticky on the surface.