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hey bro,

besides personal preference, the stroke length basically determines how much time the needles spend in the tube. in a long stroke the needles spend more time in the tube than a short stroke, so it's great for color packing and solid black because the needles tends to stay saturated with ink more, and so you get a little better ink flow and longer passes with one dip, the shorter stroke has a trade off being smoother and consistent with black and grey and smooth blends.. however you have to rely a little more on the gravity of the ink to flow out of the tube, and so you will find yourself dipping more often... with that said, every artist is different, some prefer the opposite and can make the long or short stroke work for them based on their technique. personally I prefer long stroke for everything, but I have come accustom to what works best for me....
but overall it is similar to adjusting your coil machine to achieve different results. for me, Ill have a longer stroke for color packing and solid black, and a shorter stroke for B&G and smooth color blends on my coils..

hope that help, take care.


Stephen Stacey

Hey thanks for the reply bro, yeah it makes sense now, never used a short stroke for colour but have done vice versa so will have to try, think you just made me purchase an extra 1 of each stroke now lol like you said i just find the long stroke great for packing and the short B&G work

thanks again for the solid help

I beleive the stroke length , time in barrel is off a little .the way I see it is if you hang youre needle tip out of the barrel about a 32 of an inch .its still outside the barrel .now when the needle actually gets close enough to the barrel to collect any ink, that time is less than an eigth of the time the needle is away from the barrel .basically its backwards .if you have a 4.0 mm stroke length , about .5mm of that stroke is collecting ink 3.5 mm of that stroke is spent traveling to the skin , puncturing and returning back for more ink. I agree that shorter strokes make it run faster and maybe messes with the in k sturation a bit.but this is where you slow down youre machine .say 6. Volts or so and turn youre give nob back more .this will allow more ink to be collected at one time .you will go through ink faster but will ba able to use more ink that is on the skin for shading or coloring .nit to much though cause then you start cross contaminatin.all of this is preference also I perfer a short stroke for shading and coloring .and a long stroke for lining .however compared to coik machines where a short stroke is a dime and long is a nickel wich is 1.9mm .and most rotaries are like 3.5 standard stroke .tbats long for me .2.6 for my dragonfly is good for shading .and 3.5 on my diablo swiss is great for lining.one more thing I wasnt happy with the give on my diablo kami .so I took out the spring and made the hole for tbe travel longer and put in a softer spring.anyway thats my opinion.

I beleive the stroke length , time in barrel is off a little .the way I see it is if you hang youre needle tip out of the barrel about a 32 of an inch .its still outside the barrel .now when the needle actually gets close enough to the barrel to collect any ink, that time is less than an eigth of the time the needle is away from the barrel .basically its backwards .if you have a 4.0 mm stroke length , about .5mm of that stroke is collecting ink 3.5 mm of that stroke is spent traveling to the skin , puncturing and returning back for more ink. I agree that shorter strokes make it run faster and maybe messes with the in k sturation a bit.but this is where you slow down youre machine .say 6. Volts or so and turn youre give nob back more .this will allow more ink to be collected at one time .you will go through ink faster but will ba able to use more ink that is on the skin for shading or coloring .nit to much though cause then you start cross contaminatin.all of this is preference also I perfer a short stroke for shading and coloring .and a long stroke for lining .however compared to coik machines where a short stroke is a dime and long is a nickel wich is 1.9mm .and most rotaries are like 3.5 standard stroke .tbats long for me .2.6 for my dragonfly is good for shading .and 3.5 on my diablo swiss is great for lining.one more thing I wasnt happy with the give on my diablo kami .so I took out the spring and made the hole for tbe travel longer and put in a softer spring.anyway thats my opinion.

I beleive the stroke length , time in barrel is off a little .the way I see it is if you hang youre needle tip out of the barrel about a 32 of an inch .its still outside the barrel .now when the needle actually gets close enough to the barrel to collect any ink, that time is less than an eigth of the time the needle is away from the barrel .basically its backwards .if you have a 4.0 mm stroke length , about .5mm of that stroke is collecting ink 3.5 mm of that stroke is spent traveling to the skin , puncturing and returning back for more ink. I agree that shorter strokes make it run faster and maybe messes with the in k sturation a bit.but this is where you slow down youre machine .say 6. Volts or so and turn youre give nob back more .this will allow more ink to be collected at one time .you will go through ink faster but will ba able to use more ink that is on the skin for shading or coloring .nit to much though cause then you start cross contaminatin.all of this is preference also I perfer a short stroke for shading and coloring .and a long stroke for lining .however compared to coik machines where a short stroke is a dime and long is a nickel wich is 1.9mm .and most rotaries are like 3.5 standard stroke .tbats long for me .2.6 for my dragonfly is good for shading .and 3.5 on my diablo swiss is great for lining.one more thing I wasnt happy with the give on my diablo kami .so I took out the spring and made the hole for tbe travel longer and put in a softer spring.anyway thats my opinion.

i like to stick to short strokes for lining and greywash shading, medium stroke for some good color blending and long stroke for color packing. just my opinion but everyone has different preferences.

Sorry about the three posts .dont know what happened there.

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Hey bro ,

perhaps this will help.

1. The needle will be collecting ink from the very tip of the tube to the inside of the barrel, not just the barrel, gravity also plays a roll in the ink flow thus the ink will be able to be picked up from the tip of the tube back up the the inside of the barrel..ink collection occurs on the up stroke as well as the down stroke..this is also shown by your ink becoming diluted with the blood and plasma coming from the skin back up inside your tube.

2. 1/32 of an inch is: 1.5875 inches, this is reaching the maximum of which the skin should be punctured...if your rotary has "no give", this could cause some problems when tattooing sensitive areas of the body, like the top of the foot or wrist, ect...

3. if a stroke length is 4 mm, then the needles will be moving up for 2 mm and down for 2mm,, if the penetration of the skin is max 1.5 mm then "2.5mm" will be spent traveling from the "tip" to the inside of the barrel back out to the "tip", this is the saturation and ink collection areas for the needles... 0.5 mm from the down stroke will be added to the saturation ink collection area. 2mm will be spent entirely in the up stroke and ink collection.. Thinks of it this way, if you dipped your tube and wiped the tip, you can still spread ink on the skin with the needles not running, similar to how a calligraphy pen works... if you have ever watched "PB" tattoo, he will sometimes draw on the skin with just the tip of the tube to map some areas before tattooing without running the machine... you can see here that the "ink collection" starts from the tip of the tube and back...not just the barrel...

5. if a stroke length is 2.5 mm, then the needles will be moving up for 1.25 mm and down for 1.25mm,, if the penetration of the skin is max 1.5 mm then "1 mm" will be spent traveling from the "tip" to the inside of the barrel back out to the "tip", this is the saturation and ink collection areas for the needles... 0.25 mm from the down stroke will be taken away from the saturation ink collection area. and so this is why a shorter stroke requires more dips than longer stroke and why gravity is important when using a machine with the smaller stroke lengths, you will notice this more if you are tattooing an area where you have your machine almost horizontal and you are having trouble with ink flow.. the tip area of your tube is running out of ink but the barrel is not reachable with the smaller stroke, soon as you reposition them so that your machine more perpendicular to the floor, the gravity will help the ink flow...a longer stroke will also help in situations where you find your machine is more sideways to the body...

6. you mentioned that:

"""however compared to coil machines where a short stroke is a dime and long is a nickel wich is 1.9mm .and most rotaries are like 3.5 standard stroke"""

These measurement are that of the gap of the armature bar to the top of the coil, but this is not the entire stroke length that the needles are traveling. this is determined by the air gap you have between your contact screw and the front contact spring.. this adjustment will also determine how far the armature bar will flex "above and below horizontal" as well as the predetermined setting of the bar/coil gap..this could change the stroke length or travel of your needles to 4mm +, however, the difference with the coils are they will always have some sort of give to them, depending on the spring set up. where as for rotaries the give needs to be adjusted and in some cases like the neo tat/ bishop there is no give adjustment... the standard suggested dime/nickle is helpful for the "standard coil" set up. however this may need to be changed depending on the part of the body your tattooing...


hope this helps, take care.

Stephen Stacey

Hi guys ! I am a french tattooist and i've been tattooing for 4 years now (3 years with coil machines) and this last year i've been trying to use the dragonfly machines , after reading your posts i have understood a lot about my lack of knowledge about rotary machines and about the stroke length and i'd like to thank you all for those very usefull informations that will surely help me in my future attempts. But there is still another question that i'd like to ask you : most of you say that the red devil short stroke dfly is good for doing black and grey shading work, but when you guys do the shading on a piece with this machine do you unscrew the top cap to make the hitting softer or do you keep the hardest hitting and just turn down the voltage ? As far as i know your machine speed depends also on your hand speed but i must admit that i have troubles to do very smooth shades so a little help Would be welcome Thank you in advance for your answers and sorry if i've made some mistakes ( my english is rusty ;-) )

Great info here and interesting to hear different people's takes on how they use stroke lengths to achieve different results. I'm in my second year tattooing and I'm thinking about purchasing the new Valor Rotary from TatSoul. Has a magnetic dampening system and options for 3 stroke lengths. Probably taking a risk since it's brand new but for the price and features it looks solid. I already have two Soba Pilots from Workhorse Irons and they are both great. One is setup for lining the other shading. I'm thinking about getting the 3.5 mm stroke on the rotary so it will be versatile according to whatever I need. My question is will I be able to adjust the voltage and still be able to color pack with that stroke length? That's really the only machine type I don't have now (color packer). But I would still like to try different things with the rotary once I purchase it. I suppose trial and error will play a role too. Any thoughts are appreciated.

It's pretty simple. The longer the stroke length mm (i.e. 4.0mm/3.5mm, etc), the more the needle will spend inside the tube, thus allowing for more ink for packing, coloring blending, etc. The shorter the mm stroke, the less time the needle is spent in the tube (due to speed), therefore you will be dipping more. It really comes down to personal preference. You're going to get the same result depending on your dipping preference. The most important thing is changing voltage or the nob for your needles speed if you're lining or shading.

Test on Grapefruits and see what's right for you.

Maybe this discussion ended a long time ago but i've a problem.

I've been tattooing for 1 year nog, i have a stigma prodigy and a dragonfly.
I'm trying to understand the story of the stroke lenghts but the more i read about it the more confusing it gets so maybe someone here wants to help me...

First of all you can turn the cap clockwise(=harder) and counter clockwise(=softer). So clockwise also means shorter stroke??
And counter clockwise means longer stroke??

I have read that it is personal which setting you like but the most people recommend long stroke for lining and colourpacking and shorter stroke for smooth b/g shading.

My dragonfly manual says, when the cap is turned clockwise it will give the hardest hitting and shortest stroke, but it seems weird in my head that a hard hitting is good for smooth shading or am i wrong??

Also ive been trying to turn the cap a few times counterclockwise to see if i see some change, other than the noise i see no change..

I know smooth shading etc has also to do with your hand movement but still.. i really dont know how to adjust the cap for the best setting to make soft shading or for lining,

I hope someone can explain it to me.. sorry for the long post i hope i'm clear enough and thanks in advance!

P. art,

Yes, on the Stigma's and dragonfly's, by turning the give adjustment nob on top of the machines clockwise shortens the stroke and hardens the give and counter-clockwise makes a longer stroke and softer give the more you turn the nob each direction.

To get a widen your range of options for stroke/give combinations you will need to purchase all the stroke cams for each machine(short, medium, long) or Stigma has an adjustable stroke cam for a little more that can be adjusted to whatever stroke length you prefer.

The shortest stroke length you can get would be to have the short cam installed and the give nob turned counter-clockwise to however soft you want your machine running. To have the longest hardest hit for color packing or lining if you prefer that kind of set up would be to have the long stroke cam installed with the nob turned entirely to the clockwise position. I'm not sure on the exact measurements for each stroke length and give settings though.

If you have the adjustable cam from Stigma the shortest softest set up would be to have the cam set up to the shortest position and turning the give nob to your preferred amount of give by adjusting it counter-clockwise until you find the preferred amount of give that you like for b&g shading if you like a machine with a short soft stroke to shade with . To get the a longer, but still hard stroke for packing color or lining if you like that kind of set up for those jobs set the adjustable cam to the longest position (or little less than the longest if you find to prefer some where in between the longest and shortest positions on the adjustable cam) and have your give nob at the furthest clockwise position to give you the hardest give.

You will have to experiment with stroke cams and the give nob on each machine to find the set ups you like for each machine to do whichever task you want it to do for you. Hope that helps.

Jlrodjr, thank you for making the time to explain it to me!
I just going to have to experiment with my machines which length i prefer.

But thanks i understand it better now!

This is something I struggled with about 9 years ago when swapping from coils to rotaries, but this is how I kinda figured it out in my head. I hope it is correct and helps other folk out too.
Force=mass x acceleration
If the mass of the slider and eccenter is something like 3g ( not actually weighed the bits) but it doesn't change, and same speed is used , say 100 cps , also not changing, then the acceleration must be more to get from fully back in tube - to 4.5mm than fully back in the tube - to 3.0mm
At 100cps travel is 4.5 out and 4.5 back ,so 9mmx100cps =.9m/s , and 6mmx100cps=.6m/s
On 4.5mm stroke F=3x.9 (2.7)
On 3.0mm stroke F=3x.6 (1.8)
On 2.0mm stroke F=3x.4 (1.2)
2.0 mm has less than half the hit of a 4.5 mm
Not sure how good my maths is but it put different strokes into perspective for me.

yeah, that sounds more like it, the longer the stroke the harder the hit....short stroke for lining and grey shade and a longer stroke for color..