Wear and friction characterisation of some restorative dental materials

Dental wear is a complex field of tribology study, due to the combination of wear mechanisms, such as attrition, abrasion, erosion, and abfraction. The aim of the work was the study the wear in dental restorative materials, using a reciprocate tester in order to simulate the attrition in the oral cavity. This phenomenon occurs when sliding tooth against tooth, which generates considerable wear in the area of dental occlusion in the closed phase of mastication, and in the presence of parafunction such as bruxism. The experiments were performed employing ceramic (Ceramco 3), dental silver and, composite (Filtek Z350 XT) as restorative materials and nickel-chrome alloy as counter-body, using a reciprocating tribometer manufactured according to some parameters of standard ASTM G133-05. The geometrical configuration was a sphere on a flat plane. The experimental results obtained were volume loss and coefficient of friction of the different dental restorative materials. Also, wear mechanisms like plastic deformation, cracks, and delamination between others could be identified. Keywords: dental wear, attrition, dental restorative material, reciprocating movement, wear mechanisms.