The first and only galvanic electrology school in the world: https://beverlyhillshairfree.com/
Hey, iām super sorry to hear that - as I understand Michael was well known and respected in this field. I enjoyed watching some of his videos.
Iām not one to expect anything - appreciate the sentiment though - if folks want to chip in with knowledge, thatās cool, if not, also fine.
Iām in Australia, the market here is comparatively small and quite sparse. There are some places that teach it - though I am perhaps considering offering my current electrologist an arrangement to mentor under her until I am comfortable, alongside taking the required hygiene licences.
I reached out to TES once with some questions and they did not respond. Probably saw where I was from and they donāt service here.
Iām a tinkerer, but on the professional side - I have been involved in medical grade design projects before, so itās not so difficult for me to make one, the cost would be about 10 times less. Iāve already completed a prototype.
Well, I think that you are making a mistake in judgement regarding modality and equipment honestly. Dont take this the wrong way please, Iāll explain what I mean more fully.
First off, Iām kinda known around here as a professional, but I didnt start out that way. Very much a DIYāer is where my roots are. Along the way people like Michael Bono, Dee Fahey, James Walker, Josepha Reina and many many others imparted their advice to me. I was in a desperate situation, with no income, a face full of beard a a LOT of determination to overcome this issue. I scoured everything on this site, and yes, I too was ready to build a basic galvanic circuit and do it that way. It was around that time that James Walker imparted one of his most heartfelt pieces of advice, if you are going to embark on this journey, do not rely on cobbled together components . Buy a professional grade epilator capable of performing blend treatments. Actually, this advice was almost universal for all of these Top of the electrology field professionals ( and many more) , it does not have to be expensive and one can be had for a s little as a few hundred dollars. These pieces of equipment sit in retired electrologists closets for decades, fully functional, and often available on the cheap. MAybe not as much in Austrailia, but definitely in North America and most of europe tooā¦
And this is advice I headed buying first an old ( and broken) Silouette Tone epilator then later an older Apilus machine. And it was mostly to my benefit, when I sat down to work.
Iāllstart with durability. and ergonomics. Thereās been dozens of designs and pictures posted here over the years, and some of the old geocities caches. of such devices. They arent hat hard to build or modify from things like the One touch but Michael was fond of saying the best was a simple circuit designed yourself. Thereāsa really good example of that elsewhere in the recent posts. āMy DIY setupā thread. . But then, you have to go and try and actually use it to kill hair . The problem with this, and youāre on an even keel here with the professional machine folks, you have absolutely no idea what you are doing. You lack the judgement of "thatās enough lye to destroy that follicle) ( if you even have an understanding of units of lye at all that would be amazing) but not too much. The other piece of advice universally conveyed to me was that over treatment can occur, REGARDLESS OF THE MODALITY USED. IT doesnt matter if itās Galvanic, blend or thermolysis overtreatment is a possibility if precautions and good judgement are not used.
The second reality to the path of learning electrolysis, is efficiency of epilation. . Let me tell you that nearly every electrologist I spoke too, all echo-ed the same advice, start with Galvanic. At least until you learn the basics of insertions and you have some feedback ( from your body) to know that you have that part down pat. That is you are insertig to the proper depth and creating enough lye to destroy the follicle but not so much as to create overtreatment, which may, for example exhibit symptoms such as overly large scabs or visible pitting. Whether through lye or thermolysis heat energy, we are still burning out the follicle either chemically of through heat itself. We can overdo it either way.
Then there is the learning galvanic by yourself, the reality. . I think I lasted about 90 minutes into my first foray into electrolysis ( under the chin) with galvanic energy. I was desperately afraid I had overdone it ( and I may have it took FOREVER to heal) but heal it did. 90 minutes of galvanic was all it took to convince me there had to be a better way. And there was. It was so slow a method that to clear a small area under the chin are took that much time, and often a couple minutes of galvanic per hair. Excruciatingly uncomfortable, I still remember the panic photos I took the next day and posted right here on hairtell. It was Micahel and Deedra that assured me all was well.
That better way, was to switch to blend treatments. I had the advice of the wolds foremost expert in blend treatments, the same Michael Bono answering my questions by email and hereā¦ I think every one of them was surprised at how quickly I changed and all learning from that point until some years later was in blend. The issue was, galvanic was excedingly tedious on its own. That same lye is made multiple times more caustic through the addition of heat, such as thermolysis provides. . As a result itāsno longer 1-2 minutes per hair follicle its 10-15 seconds . On a comfort scale this is much more tolerable, and the amount of themolysis used in blend treatments is miniscule compared to what is used in thermolysis treatments alone. It allows for greater efficiency and improved comfort. These days as a professional, I perform at leat 95% thermolysis only treatments. ITās what gives me the most efficiency for my clientele. But for the first several years ( and ALL of my facial treatments on myself) I used blend exclusively. The reduced thermolysis used for blend gave a better margin for error when I was learning. Even still to this day, an occasional case comes in where I say ( Yanno what? This is going to go better in blend. I absolutely LOVE doing the blend and it gives spectacular results. The increased kill rate that the presence of lye in the follicle provides post epilation is the icing on the cake. Those clients who know really well, get blend treatments from me! Iāve provided spectacular results with thermolysis too dont get me wrong, but blend is far safer ( from a use of heat energy standpoint and with inaccurate insertions) that thermolysis is. For those learning electrology, whether as a DIYEr or a professional, I recommend the blend always.
The blend however is NOT a possibility with a galvanic only DIYsetup. Thus the advice from all those professionals years ago, For this you want a professionally built machine ( especially as a novice) because I warn you, as great as simple galvanic is, awsome kill rate , beutiful results, it will quickly frustrate the hellout of you. For me, it took an hour and a half before the advice from the many pros around here really took hold and I moved on. Dont limit your options by wiring a pot and a battery together.with a probeholder. One thing youāll never see from any of the journals where people have done this, is the post years later showing off their success. Because the same thing happens to them often that does to many oone-touch or finally free units. They get delegated to the junk drawer when you inevitably get frustrated with it and move on. It took me a whole 90 minutes to come to that conclusion.
Ironically, Austrailia is the home to someone with a penchant for performing galvanic electrolysis, at one point she reportedly developed a galvanic machine for mass production but Iām pretty sure that is vapourware. . Galvanic operators can sometimes have a reputatiion for being overly vocal about percieved evils of thermolysis and benefits of galvanic, and ya that summed her up. Patience I think her name was, I only remember this because I was thinking Goddess give me the patience was a good way of remembering that . I dont really know much more about where to find her now but it seems to me if you are thinking of going into just galvanic she may have some input for you or maybe the machine is built for AUS power systems? Heck maybe its not vapourware? I dont really know as sometimes things just seem to disappear into the ether.
Iāve had good luck with Intantron and Apilus, I dont know if skip does power conversions however but I know apilus does have the functionality to provide epilators on several power systems. I had also heard something about possibly a dectro presence in Austrailia? Itās worth looking into as they do have electrolysis schools in several different places and are the makers of Apilus. Something is telling me this was a school and equipment supplier combined but I cant remember precisely where i heard that. I checked the academie-dectrro site and they are not showing any partner schools in AUS ( or california, where Iām certain there was one? ) so I dont know it may be best to contact them.
1 Like
Heya, sorry for the delayed response, thereās actually a good(ish) reason for it.
I did actually take your words on board and had a thinkā¦ Regardless of the equipment I need to do things right.
So Iāve actually been busy studying, and yesterday I was just granted my certificate for hygiene/skin puncture infection control which is a legal requirement here for practising electrolysis. I have also engaged town planners/developers, my local council about requirements for setting up a home studio properly. Iāve setup my website ready to go and already have folks signing up to support my training. My current electrologist is also coaching me on this journey.
Iāve started to hunt around for schools for practical assessment here, though my experience so far has been quite cliquey - most places want to see a full beauty therapy certificate before I train, which is kind of nuts since I have done a PhD and worked in far more clinicially interesting medical environments than I imagine most electrologists have witnessed. But somehow they want the piece of paper that says I know how to apply makeup or a do a head massageā¦Very weird.
But I will be persistent in finding somewhere that will understand and support me via training.
I will play around with my other side-projects along side it, but I actually want to help folk here reach their hair removal goals more than I want to invent new equipment right now. Iāve also narrowed down my choices to the SX-B or Junior, most likely the Junior. The SX-B is a better cost choice for me right now, but it does seem extremely limited in control compared to the junior (especially for thermolysis pulse times), plus buying equipment gives me the ability to do blend as well. And the equipment I made, I can probably actually just attach it to the existing equipment so I donāt have to reinvent the wheel. So iāve registered with Dectro to see if I can find pricing or what their requirements are to allow purchase of equipment.