Is This THE END for Coil Tattoo Machines? 

I can see your point and tattooers are generally traditional folks who like to stick to the old way of doing things... but on the other hand, that's like saying why should we use computer printers when we had the printing press that works fine. At some point you gotta move on if the technology gets good enough to surpass the old. Whether we're at that point or not yet is up to each individual, but I'm sure it'll happen eventually.

hallelujah!

@@BabyJesus66 The traditional artist prefer coils in most cases as you say. Thats true. Including me. I believe there are different tools for different jobs. I wouldn’t want to do a black and gray realism piece with a coil. Rotaries are great for that and fine line. To me. And this is my opinion only. Coils must live on for tradition, for those who still need them, and for those who want to collect them. Ink goes in same way as it always did. It would be sad to see builders like Mike Pike fade away. Never ending debate but always fun to talk about. To each their own but don’t take my tools lol

I hand stencil everything as well

Good Point

Right on

Thankyou!

Thankyou! 🙏👍

You're welcome 😊

600 a week for booth rent? That should be the monthly price

My daughter Beth made as a part of her apprenticeship when she was only 14! 🙏👍

wow she must have turned out to be a great artist congrats .@@ThatTattooShow

Thank you 🤗

I absolutely agree with the point about multiple machines .. I saw a few videos recently on the Mast Tour Pro.. I dont own one and doubt i will.. but what I noted is the machine has a switch/button to change the stroke length (2.4, 2.8, 3.2 etc, up to 4.2) on the fly.. So.. it can be done.. they're selling these machines at £250-ish.. so it cab be done reasonably easy I'm guessing at not a great cost to the manufacturer. So the high end suppliers 'could' provide this functionality The first one who takes the plunge will make a nice pay check.. but.. then they cant sell multiple machines to us as that stroke change functionality would become expected 🙄😏

Exactly. the past offers a better future than the current present offers. Reusable works. It’s proven and it’s eco locally sound. So why is everything disposable now? Simple. Profit & convenience.

Yes, I’ve seen them and we’re currently trying to get hold of them for a review. I think it’s inkclaw that make them - p

Hey, I’ve spoken to the welsh government environmental health department regarding this. The response I got was… If you barrier your pen machine appropriately, use membrane cartridges then and handle the cartridges correctly then there is no need to autoclave the pen grips. While they need to be visually clean and cleaned with the appropriate detergents etc they don’t need to be autoclaved. The reason for this is due to the only part that needs to be sterile is the piece that makes direct contact with broken skin. In the case of cartridge machines that’s the safety cartridge which is sterile and disposable. The only time you would realistically get contamination inside the grip is if you are handling the cartridges at the wrong place, which in that case I would say it’s better to autoclave and use disposable as well as being more competent in infection prevention and control procedures. There’s more risk of contamination with artists tattooing while wearing watches, bracelets and long sleeve tops tbh. Tattooing as a procedure is clinically clean at best.

@@ThatTattooShow cheers mate was just curious about the whole end of the coil part in the video,think it’s different in every county to be honest Thanks for the reply

While I agree with a lot of what you are saying. The one thing I completely disagree on is that coil machines are cleaner. I’ve spoken to an infection control specialist and they have said the only way to truly clean a coil machine is to strip it down between usages. Which to a degree is correct. Also coil machines that have more of a material wrap on the coils poses a massive issue regarding cross contamination and the inability to clean it adequately. Even if you bag a coil machine the will be airborn pathogens going up the tube and back stem, flooding the inside of the back and covering the machine with bacteria. From an ease of cleaning standpoint a rotary would be better depending on the type used. And if you are following the correct IPC protocols a rotary pen used with membrane carts is far easier to keep clean. I stripped down a flux recently that has been used pretty much daily and the internals of that was pristine. No ink residue, no grime, no dust. However I’m pretty sure if you looked at a coil machine that had been used daily the you would see signs of dirt in hard to reach areas, unless you are completely stripping it down after each use and disinfecting then whole frame and parts that go along with it.

@@ThatTattooShow when using carts you can NOT rely on the cart membrane to keep your machine from being contaminated, they can and do fail and its not exactly rare for it to happen, especially with longer stroke machines. this is a big issue i see with carts, people just trust they are clean and dont disinfect their machine properly between clients. think of this scenario 1. you are tattooing a client 2. you (as everyone does) swap between carts, exposing the plunger end to a contaminated environment or without thinking about it you touch the plunger end, either way the cart is now contaminated. 3. you swap again, sticking your now contaminated cart back into the machine. the machine is now contaminated even if it looks perfectly clean inside, the inside of the grip and the plunger bar inside the machine ( thats usually covered in grease that holds bacteria ) is contaminated. now you do the same thing for your next client, you stick a cart into a contaminated machine you think is clean, you swap between carts and easily contaminate your gloves that you are now touching your clients open skin with. its that easy to infect someone without ever thinking about it. the cool thing about using cartridges is that you can swap them out easily while tattooing, the dangerous part about cartridges is that you can swap them out while tattooing. you MUST break the machine down and completely disinfect the grip and the internal plunger bar between clients every time. nothing wrong with using them but its very easy to create a cross contamination hazard of a machine without realizing it. using a coil machine with a traditional needle on bar setup doesnt have this risk, you set the machine up how its going to be used and thats it. the safest setup for tattooing is using a coil machine or traditional rotary with disposable tube/grip and regular needle on bar. the risk of contaminates traveling up the tube and getting on the machine and then somehow traveling back down the tube and contaminating it for your next client is pretty much non existent, you wipe the machine down anyways. the real risk that infects people is cross contamination with your gloves and then spreading that to your client, thats much easier to do and more likely to happen with a pen machine that you are swapping carts on, especially if people are not breaking the pen down and cleaning it with something like cavicide between tattoos.

What about when people are not bagging the coil machines? Playing the the vice to change needle hang? Or adjusting the contact screw? Or what about the airborne pathogens that go up the back stem and contaminate the machine that’s bagged? There are risks with everything and when it comes to tattooing a lot of it is down to user error, not following correct IPC procedure. So realistically you should be also stripping down a coil machine to clean it just like you say it needs to be done for a pen machine. I’ve seen some shocking stuff at shows in regards to the way people handle coil machines that are un bagged. That respect there’s more risk of contamination with a coil. That being said you also have people wearing denim aprons and doing multiple tattoos in a day with the same apron. People not using the correct work surfaces to tattoo off, Wearing watching and other jewellery when tattooing, People with false nails when tattooing, There’s a lot of things that cause cross contamination and it’s generally down to people not educated on IPC and not following the correct procedures for when they tattoo.

Technology isn’t the danger that faces our beloved coils. Legislation is. If it can’t be produced to new medical ‘standards’ it could be legislated out of the industry. Whilst I understand that there are many costs in manufacture that we tattooers don’t I still think that any business should start from a pricepoint and build a solid business plan based on these costs rather than pass the costs as they arises over to the end consumer.

Legislation has in the past and is still banning tattooing. (New York and other parts of the US east coast, Japan still is a legal grey area) It survived and some say it made it even stronger. With the truly dedicated going underground and continuing to tattoo. A business is defined as an agreement with mutual benefit. If the machine companies pay all the cost and cannot make a profit to survive or make it attractive to keep the business going, then the owners will have no interest in keeping it open. Honestly also even a lower earning tattooer can most likely save enough money to buy even the most expensive machine on the market within 1-2 months. Compared with most other industries tattoo equipment is still quite affordable. (example lower end professional guitars start in the 1000-2000 range and go up easily to close 5000-10000). There are business out there that do just that in they set a price point and build the machine according to that. (cheap eBay machines) You can't unfortunately have it both ways. Just like we say a cheap tattoo is not good and a good tattoo is not cheap. @@ThatTattooShow

Hope you are enjoying your holiday. That is an interesting question and we will look into it to provide some sort of an answer

@@ThatTattooShow certainly am 😂 and thanks for the reply 👌🏼

Totally agree.

So more single use plastic into landfill then? For Every item we use there was/is/could be an ecologically sound version. Operating theatres reuse cleaned, previously contaminated items all the time. Sometimes without autoclaving them (try getting a rib spreader in a clave!) What we should be doing is thoroughly cleaning and inspecting our equipment and, if we don’t feel it’s possible to fully clean, we should be using cleanable, reusable items whenever possible. Reusable not disposable. That’s actually the future. Full stop.

Smaller operations have less over heads in comparison to larger factories such as, rent, amount of employees, electric, gas, insurance, maintenance, pensions, sick pay, holiday pay etc etc. also not all of Western Europe is as expensive as the us, we also didn’t say Western Europe we said europe which is a larger area to cover with a wider price range. Facts checked ;)