Straight Barbells - The most popular
Straight barbell tongue ring piercings are almost always done with 14 gauge barbells. 14 gauge is the most common tongue ring gauge used. The tongue ring used to perform the tongue piercing should be at least ¾” to allow for swelling in the tongue. The piercing once healed can be replaced to a smaller barbell of 9/16"(14mm) which is the most common size. Wearing a shorter tongue ring barbell after the piercing is healed is recommended.
Barbell style body jewelry, including tongue rings, is made up of a straight bar with a bead on each end that can be unscrewed. Often one of the beads is united, either via epoxy or welding, so that only one bead is used to fix or remove the body jewelry. Barbell threads on body jewelry are most often right handed.
There are five kinds of barbells that are most often used for tongue rings and other body jewelry. The internally threaded barbells are slightly more expensive than externally threaded barbells as there will be additional labor involved. However, they are considered superior because this type of body jewelry is less likely to cause damage, especially when using the body jewelry during initial piercing. The bead in an internally threaded barbell has a getting tube machine into it with a threaded post extending from the center, which mates with the threaded receiving tube on the bar.
Internally threaded body jewelry has become more and more popular, causing the use of externally threaded body jewelry to decline. It is so named because shaft of the bar has threads at both ends to permit beads with internal threads to be attached.
In naval piercings, it is much more common to use a curved barbell, named for its curvature, and in tongue ring piercings it is much more common to use a straight barbell. Curved barbells, often used for naval rings are mechanically identical to straight barbells, often used for tongue rings with the exception of the curvature. Curvature on a curved barbell can range from about straight to circular, with some barbells basically being spiral, with the ends overlapping but separated to permit the insertion of the jewelry. Curved barbells can either be internally or externally threaded.
A variation in this body jewelry design is a J-bar, a slightly curved barbell (sometimes referred to as a bananabell or banana barbell) with a 90 degree bend near one end, used in vertical navel piercings to position the decorative end of the body jewelry more
appropriately. This type of popular body jewelry can be either internally threaded or externally threaded.
Another type of body jewelry popularly used in naval rings is the circular barbell, also called a horseshoe barbell. They are named so due to their shape.
Surface bars are used in body jewelry for surface piercings. In order to used this barbells for surface piercing it has a pair of 90 degree bends in the same direction. This body jewelry design allows the pressure that would be caused by other body jewelry to be alleviated and allows for shorter healing time.
