Why does Andrea list the Proteus as a scam-- electrolysis machines?
Proteus went scam, but the early machines were legitimate. Not much to recommend them, but they should work.
This is a real blend system. The starting bid is a bit high at $500, but maybe it’ll be relisted at a lower point.
Relisted again - I guess no takers the first couple of times around.
But this one is a Thermolysis only machine, correct?
yeah, it’s thermolis only. But the Clareblend does all three I believe-- blend, thermo, and galvanic. The price for it is too rich for my blood, rather practice my electrolysis skills with the simple OneTouch before the big stuff.
Btw, can anyone recommend a reasonably priced lighted magnifier?
this is not on eBay and it’s not cheap but i think it’s worth posting:
The Fischer machine is so real that Vector/Global even makes a device designed to look just like the Fischer to the casual eye, if they only look at a picture of it.
I’ve never heard of the “Servo” brand, but it looks legitimate.
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Here’s someone selling the Uniprobe Autoblend Lite. While not an ideal machine, it might be pretty good for learning whether you’ve got the time, ability, and pain tolerance to do-it-yourself or do-it-to-each-other:
Professional Electrolysis Epilator - needle type
About 2/3 of the machines we see are thermolysis only. We’re reluctant to recommend them, because your results will be significantly better with blend, and you’ll be significantly faster with flash. So why are they recommended at all? Because they’re a (relatively) cheap way to figure out whether you’ll be able to stick with home electrolysis.
Electrolysis requires:
- Time (and lots more of it than a good pro would require)
- Skill: good manual dexterity, good hand-eye coordination
- Tolerance for pain
- Equipment
You can test whether you’ll pass the first three with a cheap thermolysis machine and a magnifying lamp. Then, after spending a few hours doing insertions and if it seems workable, seriously consider purchasing a fully featured machine, binocular loupes, and so on.
- Eric
can anyone recommend a reasonably priced lighted magnifier?
I tried using a lighted magnifier and hated it. One way to make it better would be to replace the bulb (circle fluorescent) with a high-CRI bulb, such as warm white, or get a halogen light to shine from the side. Besides that, I’m afraid I don’t have any specfiic product recommendations.
- Eric
the Clareblend does all three I believe-- blend, thermo, and galvanic.
I believe virtually all blend machines do blend, thermo, and galvanic. To do thermo, turn off the DC. To do galvanic, turn off the RF. What really counts is whether the machine is flash capable - which I believe this is not.
- Eric
Since flash is a type of thermolysis, why isn’t it included with thermolysis machines?
I’m surpised to hear about the magnifiers, since every electrologist I’ve been to uses it. Are binoculars much better? It strikes me as odd though.
Since flash is a type of thermolysis, why isn’t it included with thermolysis machines?
Flash is fast thermolysis, typically less than a second. This has several important implications:
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There’s no ability for the electrologist to monitor treatment intensity. They can only experiment with different settings to strike a balance between undertreatment and overtreatment.
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Because the heating is so rapid, the tissue destruction zone is more localized. With RF heating, there is a “point effect” in which the greatest intensity is at the needle tip.
The result is that electrologist skill is significantly more important for flash than for slower methods. It really is a distinct mode from the slower methods.
- Eric
I’m surpised to hear about the magnifiers, since every electrologist I’ve been to uses it. Are binoculars much better?
James did a nice explanation of why serious electrologists don’t use them.
There are many problems with the magnifiers. The ones I found were:
The hair you are epilating has to be very near the center of the lens, or the view of the follicle is distorted. This means you are constantly adjusting the lens position. If the patient shifts even slightly, the lens has to be adjusted.
The spacing between your eyes is large enough that when the view through one eye is on-axis on the lens, the view through the other eye is off-axis, so each eye sees a different view. You virtually have to close one eye.
The circle fluorescent typically has a poor color rendering index (CRI). That means that, especially with lighter hairs, the contrast between the hair and skin disappears. Furthermore, the light is diffuse and so there are no shadows - which are important for fine hand-eye coordination. By far the preferable light source is halogen, which renders colors perfectly and shows distinct shadows. I use a halogen spotlight, which is a reasonable approximation of a fiber optic halogen illuminator.
The spacing between the lens and skin is narrow enough to make working between the two awkward.
When your face is close enough to the lens to make the magnification useful, you end up breathing on and fogging up the lens.
Maybe they work better for others, but these were my experiences. Bono has an excellent section on lighting and magnification - at first I didn’t believe him and tried a magnifier, and shortly gave up and went with binocular loupes, which have been satisfactory.
To give electrolysis the credit it deserves: It’s a microsurgical procedure. No microsurgeon would suture nerves without a parallel beam halogen light source and a surgical microscope.
Hope that helps,
- Eric
The only thing I have to add to that excellent answer is that the heat from the circle lamp can cause discomfort, and a person who moves under one can bump the lamp, and may get burned by the bulb as well.
Stereo Scopes and Loupes have the advantage of keeping your vision and ligh equipment far enough away from the client that they can sneeze and not endanger themselves or the equipment. Fiber optics keep all of the heat of the halogen lamp away from the client, although many halogen spot lights can be placed far enough away to not have a problem with this, however, the electrologist would still have to move the spot, and therefore touch the light source many times during treatment. With a fiber optic built into the scope, when you have set your vision, you have set your light as well.
Lastly, stereo scopes give you a field of vision that stays still and doesn’t shake, like binoculars that are worn on the face, and don’t need one to put one’s eyes all the way on them to see.
All that said, decent work can be done with a circle lamp, but for someone who was making it their life long profession, I would expect enough dedication to have the best equipment. It only increases their ability to work better, and faster. The more comfortable your clients, the faster you get their work done, the more clients you will have, and the more work each will be willing to get done.
and shortly gave up and went with binocular loupes, which have been satisfactory.
- Eric
So what brand/source of binoculars would you guys recommend? the ones i see on google are frightningly expensive <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" />
For the do it yourselfer, would it not work to buy prescription glasses from Walmart or something like that? if we are not making it our live’s profession and we only need to “maintain” hairlessness as the years pass. what do you think?
A local electrologist is selling two of her back up machines and i think they are great deals, but i wanted to double check with you two.
Is a Fischer SE-2 with a probe, new cables and pedal (only pedal operated), no needles, lamp or loops, for $300 better than a Apilus Jr (all attachments like the fisher), works on automatic or foot pedal, for $450? Both machines have all three modes.
please let me know b/c she is waiting for me to give her an answer… you can e-mail me at in22@drexel.edu
thanks a mil.
As a non professional, you would be better with the Apilus Jr.