I know using a pressure cooker instead of an autoclave has been covered so I hope not to get replies about how to search yahoo answers. My question is a bit different. The reason it is necessary to use an autoclave to sterilize is because it holds more pressure then a pressure cooker 17psi vs 15psi which enables water to boil hotter and reach the sterilization point. The difference between the two is about 3 degrees celceus ref : http://www.sterilizers.com/autoclave-tim… ; This in the medical/tattoo world is I take it an important 3 degrees. So with a pressure cooker you would get it close to sterile but you would never know for sure if it actually was.
Now with dry heat sterilization as used in hospitals a convection oven is used to keep even temperature. This is a well accepted way of sterilization in the medical world used less only because heat transfer through air is less efficient then water and therefor takes longer. However, in a convection oven you could put your ultrasonic cleaned tattoo tubes at a sterilizing temperature for a very long time and know for sure the item was raised to the appropriate temperature for sterilization. Ref : http://www.devicelink.com/mddi/archive/0…

So here’s the deal. I want to use metal tubes but disposable needles and tips. This means the only thing I would really need to sterilize would be the tubes themselves which have minimal impact but none the less an impact. Wouldn’t I be safer sterilizing them with a convection oven that I know has brought them to the appropriate temperature evenly for the appropriate time, or a pressure cooker which gets it close to the sterilization point but is more closely matched to the use of an autoclave? Thanks in advance!