Collection: Tattoo Long Needle & Cartridges

Simply with water! When you're setting up your workstation and measuring your ink into caps, make sure to keep a cup of distilled water nearby. When you want to change the color or clean extra ink or bodily fluids from the cartridge, immerse the running machine in water for a few seconds, being careful not to contact the sides since this can bend the needles. Then, with the machine turned off, use a paper towel to dry the cartridge. You can also use items like DipCaps, which contain a foam that quickly absorbs the ink on the needles and prevents paper cloth clumps from being trapped in them!

Dip the cartridge tip into a filled ink cap while the tattoo machine is running to draw ink up and into the cartridge. Clear cartridges have the advantage of allowing you to see precisely how much ink you've drawn up and keep track of how much is left in the cartridge, but any cartridge must not be too full to function properly!

If you're working on one client and need to change needle cartridges during the session, you can reuse the same tattoo cartridge. After all, you can start with a liner, then do some shading, and then conclude with more lining - as long as you complete it all in the same session and store them in a cartridge tray while not in use, you'll be OK! You should never reuse a tattoo cartridge on a different person or during a subsequent sitting. Tattoo cartridges, like needles, are single-use devices, and using them on multiple clients can readily spread bacteria and viruses such as HIV and hepatitis. When you're finished with a session, dispose of all cartridges in the properly labeled yellow sharps container!