Thunder vs Hawk/Spirit

After using the Thunder for a couple of months or so now I'm feeling that in some ways I prefer the original Hawk.

Shading:-
Both machines shade equally well, I haven't found the extra stroke length on the thunder has made it any better or worse in that department.

Packing:-
Both put in colour qually well. I've never thought the hawk was a good machine for doing stuff like tribal though, but IMO that's mainly down to the pins used in the cheyenne cartridges. Where as the standard t-tech mags with their medium taper will hammer solid colour in with either machine.

Lining:-
The hawk/spirit definitely requires a bit of adjustment to line with it or you can get weak lines and snags, but once you get it down they do it well. The Hawk was actually the first machine I loved lining with, and that includes coils.
The thunder on the other hand is much easier to switch to from other machines IMO. The extra stroke length has eliminated the occasional snagging when pushing your lines that the old machines used to have.
I don't think the Thunder produces a better line than the hawk, but it does require less adjustment on your technique.

General usage:-
I've had a year or so of loving the Hawk, I think its ran great on any PSU I've tried. A couple of the bigger needle groupings required a higher voltage to start, but not all the time, and its usually just a case if putting it on to my lining patch before going back to the shading one.
The thunder on the other hand has been a bit of a pain. Without the startup cable it almost always needs bumping up to around 12v to get it going. And even then it wont start if you have a lot of needle hang and usually also requires an on-off-on jumpstart.
With the startup cable it is better, but even that doesn't work all the time, so I'm still doing the on-off-on jumpstart on occasion.
Obviously it's supposed to work fine on the official PSU which might be my next purchase.



So in summary, I think for me I might prefer the original. It's quieter and smoother sounding. Runs easier on non cheyenne PSUs and performs just as well as I have already got used to using it for lining.
For people new to the cheyenne system I can see that the thunder would be the better option.. but only if you buy a cheyenne PSU.

That's very interesting, thank you

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Agreed with most of this. I find the hawk/spirit does just fine. However once I bought the pu1 I pretty much only use my thunder. I like that the hawk/spirit are both way less noisy but the little extra oomph the thunder has is good in difficult areas like bellies and armpits and such. All in all if you don't wanna buy the pu I'd stick with the spirit, if ya get the pu deffinatly get the thunder I thinks it's worth it.

it seems like a lot of headaches to tattoo.Thats why i still love my coils will run on a crap power supply even.:cool:

it's not a headache with the older machines. and to be honest t-tech cartridges don't usually need the voltage jump the cheyenne ones do

i just got that new cord from Cheyenne. My spirit has been having the exact same symptoms as the thunder ..i plugged it in with my spirit tested the same cartridge,different cables...the new cheyenne cable is the cure...i highly recommend the cable to any one having the same issues...

I agree with slicksteel. too much trouble .

I use the t tech cartriges and the machine starts at a lower voltage so no need for the chord as u do if you use the cheyenne tips The t tech needles have nice liners and the quality is better than cheyenne so far that ive seen. I use it everyday. I constantly have bad cheyenne mags. The needles are above the guide in the tip. And the liners are more like bugpin liners where t tech is a looser needle group so its more comfortable to me. More like standard needle groupings. I got frustated paying so much for an item with low or little quality control. So to sum it up you dont nee the special chord with the t tech tips on the hawk n hawk spirit. I know nothing about the thunder tho. -Carson

I've hardly had any issues with either companys cartridges to be honest. But yeah more with Cheyenne than t-tech.
the weirdest one is when I had a row of five 27mags. 4 were curved and 1 was straight. Lol

On a side note I've been using the PU-I since posting this and have been surprised at how much nicer the thunder runs on it.