A Comprehensive Guide to Prison Tattoos: How to Make a Prison Tattoo Gun

It’s possible that you’ve watched dramas and films where convicts tattoo each other; a clean sweeper might end up inked! However, have you ever pondered how these rebels manage to obtain a prison tattoo gun?

Not a single jail in the world permits tattoos or the use of needles for body art. It doesn’t seem very admirable to see condemned criminals brandishing guns.

If you’re interested in learning how convicts tattoo their own bodies or ink other people, the process involves a lot of time, talent, expertise, and tactics, along with a dash of MacGyver.

What is basically prison tattoo gun and what’s the purpose of it?

An instrument used in prisons to apply tattoos is called a “prison tattoo gun”. For those imprisoned, these tattoos, which are often very basic, carry particular meaning. The tattoo gun can be built using items that convicts discover, like as pens or appliance motors, and is not like the ones employed by experienced artists who do tattoos.

Although creating and using these makeshift tattoo guns might be dangerous and is typically prohibited in jail, individuals utilize them as a means of expressing their experiences and connections.

Materials Needed to Create a Prison Tattoo Gun

The key components of the ideal tattoo machine are ink, needles, and a solid structure. This is a full guide on creating a tattoo gun for a prison. Let’s get started discussing the fundamentals.

1. Prison tattoo ink

The majority of jail tattoos are in grayscale or black and white. And with good reason—the majority of prison tattoo ink is created using soot, sometimes known as “lamp black” in the tattoo community.

How to manufacture soot: 

Prisoners usually produce soot to use as tattoo ink in the following ways:

• Wrap a few toilet paper rolls in some grease or oil (such as Vaseline) and twist it tightly. Cooking or commissary oil is typically taken from prison kitchens.
• Set the twisted toilet paper on flame and place it beneath any shiny metallic surface, such the interior of a box or a prison bunk.
• After a while, pure black soot, or lampblack, will begin to accumulate at the foot of the metal’s surface from the flame’s point.
• After a significant amount of soot has accumulated, gather it on paper by scraping it from the surface. Shiny paper works well since the soot will adhere to it.
• Blend the gathered soot with your favorite liquid or blender to create permanent black ink that is perfect for tattooing.
• Use water to dilute the soot to generate grayscale. However, because you must apply precisely the proper amount to achieve a decent gray hue, this also requires practice.

Ingredients to make soot tattoo ink

The ingredients for soot tattoo ink include soot, water, and a liquid binder. Because soot and water are immiscible and binder facilitates their mixing, it is necessary. However certain people further mix toothpaste or hand lotion with water and soot, the most popular formula for novices to manufacture soot ink is:

• Soot, one spoonful
• Ten water droplets
• A single drop of liquid soap or shampoo

Acrylic paints, which are sold to prisoners for artistic endeavors, are used to make less prevalent tattoo ink. The pure pigment and acrylic binder will separate once it has sat for a while. After that, some toilet paper is used to absorb the binder.

Then there’s the third, less popular choice, which is original tattoo ink. Personnel working in prisons smuggle the latter.

2. Prison Tattoo Needles

Having successfully created permanent black ink, you now require the appropriate needle set.

Sewing needles that can be purchased in kits at the commissary are typically used by amateurs. The ideal needle is extremely tiny and pointed to cause the least amount of skin injury possible. But because of their extreme thickness, such needles have the potential to injure the skin excessively.

Making tattoo needles in prison

The thin spring used in retractable click pens is most frequently utilized to make tattoo needles. After being taken out, the spring is painstakingly straightened, chopped to the proper length, and refined.

However, using a guitar ‘G’ metal string is the more popular but challenging way to create a tattoo needle. The metal string is taken out, straightened, chopped, and sharpened, just like the pen’s spring. These are limited to prisons that have access to musical instruments.

Sharpening the tattoo needle

• Electrolysis is a basic science that is involved here.
• Fill an empty cup or pill container with salt and water.
• Using a length of cable, attach the needle to the positive end of a power source, such as the battery or an AC/DC adaptor.
• Attach a second wire to the power source’s negative end and submerge it in seawater.
• The end of the positively charged needle will soon turn black. To sharpen the needle, it is wiped clean and the procedure is repeated several times.

3. Motorized Tattoo Machine

After creating your prison ink and a dependable tattoo needle, we’ll talk about the subject at hand: the motorized tattoo machine.

Basic jail tattoo guns consist of three primary parts:

• A motor that provides power to the needles so that it can vibrate rapidly up and down.
• A barrel, typically constructed from a pen barrel, that centers and retains the needle.
• A toothbrush is typically used to create a frame that supports the barren underneath the motor.

Pens and toothbrushes are readily accessible and sold at practically every jail commissary. They are inexpensive and regarded as disposable.

However, the engine must to be compact enough to readily slide into the tattoo gun. You may be shocked to learn that there are a number of fast ways to obtain tiny motors in prison.

For example, it is occasionally allowed for prisoners to purchase personal radios or tape recorders, and the motors on these devices would be ideal for a prison tattoo gun. Inmates may also obtain beard trimmers from certain prisons, and these tools’ motors are most frequently utilized to create tattoo guns. Other trustworthy sources are modest fan motors and typewriter motors (which are available in jails for typing legal documents).

There may already be a spindle on your motor. It is an off-center component on the rotating wheel that quickly turns everything attached to it while it spins. If you don’t already have one, you may quickly create one by soldering or adhering a tiny paper clip slightly off the center of the motor’s rotating area.

Bringing the Prison Tattoo Gun Together

You now have everything you need to put together a functional prison tattoo gun!

What you should do is as follows:

• Take off the ink tube of the pen, leaving the ball tip intact.
• Cut the ‘ball’ off the ball-tip with nail clippers to form a tiny hole that is around the size of your needle (hint: if you’re using a toothbrush, you might need to melt the head to get a 90-degree angle).
• Use nail clippers or scissors to cut the barrel. The barrel needs to be just a little bit longer than your needle.

• Attach the barrel to the mount and fasten laundry bags with rubber bands or zip ties.
• Connect the motor to the highest point of the mount and secure it tightly using zipper ties or rubber straps.
• Insert the point of the needle through the barrel’s opening and encircle its spindle with the opposite side. In this way, the needle’s tip rotates while staying fixed by the barrel while the motor turns, resulting with a mostly upward and downward motion with every turn.

Importance of Safety in Making and Using a prison Tattoo Gun

It is impossible not to emphasize how crucial safety is when creating and utilizing a prison tattoo gun. Even while these improvised instruments are frequently created out of need inside of prisons, they have inherent risks that, if not handled wisely, might have dire repercussions.

Preventing viruses

It’s essential to take safety precautions to avoid infections that may result through using non-sterile tools and processes. Serious health problems and complications, such as skin abnormalities and, in severe situations, systemic infections, can result from infections. Adequate safety measures have the potential to drastically lower these dangers.

Reducing Allergic Problems

Adhesives and ink replacements, two non-medical items that are frequently employed in prison tattoo guns, can cause allergic reactions. Safety precautions aid in the selection of substances that are more unlikely to trigger reactions and in guaranteeing that they are not hazardous to use.

Prevention Against Skin Complications

 Safety involves the health of the individual getting inked as well as the tattoo designer. Insecure tattooing techniques can lead to skin issues like keloids or scars. Adequate safety protocols can lower the likelihood of these problems.

Long-Term Health Concerns

 Considering the possibility of introducing hazardous materials into the skin, getting a tattoo in an unhygienic setting raises the possibility of serious health consequences. Safety provides relief from these worries.

Ethical responsibilities of tattoo artists in prison using prison tattoo guns

These ethical responsibilities are implied while using prison tattoo guns by tattoo artists in jail.

Informed Consent

 When tattooing prisoners, designers ought to ensure they are aware of all the dangers involved, including the possibility of getting sick or allergic response. Prisoners must give consent with knowledge while comprehending any possible health risks.

Refusing Unsafe Demands

 Moral tattoo artists ought to decline demands to create tattoos that are extremely risky or might have a negative impact on their health. Refusing to utilize potentially harmful or contaminated products is part of this.

Maintaining client’s privacy

Tattoo artists are required to respect their clients’ right to privacy and secrecy. This can entail keeping private any sensitive information that is discovered during the tattooing procedure in a jail setting.

Preserving Hygiene

 It is imperative that tattoo equipment be kept neat and clean, as this is a crucial moral duty. Tattoo artists must adhere to precautions to reduce the health hazards connected to unhygienic equipment.

Avslutning

And that’s how a prison tattoo gun is made. After dipping the needle into the ink, move the motor quickly multiple times per second, up and down into the skin. Move your tattoo machine slowly as the needle penetrates the flesh to permanently ink you or another prisoner in the design of your choice. The depth to which the needle penetrates the skin, the methods you employ to create shading and other tattoo elements, and—above all—your hygienic practices are some things to watch out for.

The act of making tattoo needles while imprisoned reveals the resourcefulness and courage of prisoners living in restricted spaces. These improvised tools are a way for people to interact, tell stories, and express themselves in a world when individual freedom is scarce. However, since improper sterilization and safety precautions might result in infections and problems, it is imperative to recognize the related risks to health and possible effects.

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