Steel tips, the points at the end of the tattoo tube, are a part of the machine that tattoo artists use to draw tattoos on human skin. The piece of the machine that actually touches the skin is called the needle. It is the needle that is connected to the steel tube. The steel tube is then inserted into the autoclave; the autoclave must be plugged into an electricity source in order for the machine to work.
Most tattoo artists use steel tubes on human skin; these steel tubes are not disposable and need to be sterilized thoroughly before being used a second time. There is a variety of disposable tattoo tubes, but these disposable tubes are made of plastic, which does not exhibit the same qualities when used on human skin. According to the Tattoo Education website, these plastic disposable tubes have one thing going for them: convenience. The author of the site finds them difficult to use on skin. There is a type of tattoo tube, however, that melds plastic and steel and is disposable; these disposable tubes, according to the site, offer the best of both worlds — that same convenience along with a higher quality tattoo.
Contrary to its name, a diamond tip is not made out of diamonds. Diamond tips are made out of stainless steel, as are most tattoo tubes; the difference between diamond tips and round tips, for example, is the shape. The body a tattoo tube with a diamond tip looks much like the body of a tattoo tube with a round tip. The difference is in the tip itself; a diamond tip is shaped almost like a small triangle.
Round tips are distinguished from diamond tips by only one quality: The end of the tip, where the tattoo needle is inserted, is perfectly round. Both tattoo tubes are generally made of stainless steel.
The difference, according to Eddie Tana, a blogger with a tattoo supply company, is twofold. First, the diamond-tip tattoo tubes hold more ink. Second, they are more stable when tattooing with the needle placed at different angles. Ray Webb, writing in the “Tattoo Needle Primer,” however, argues that any stainless steel tip should only be used when tattooing solely in black. He says that the metal from the tips can discolor colored ink.