Dental Inspection with PowerINSPECT


Accuracy in the dental market has always be an area of great concern because of the necessity to achieve a good fit at the margin for crowns and bridges. To investigate this a tooth preparation and a matching coping, which was produced using traditional methods, were digitised on a Triclone dental scanner from Renishaw.

The coping measured was deemed to have a good quality of fit by dental clinicians so therefore presented an interesting case study when it came to quantifying the acceptable accuracy between the coping and preparation.


colour map of the accuracy of a Single Tooth
An instant colour map is produced of the accuracy of a Single Tooth


By using CopyCAD it is possible to take the two separate 3D scans, of the inside of the coping and preparation, and perform a virtual fit of the coping on top of the preparation. Numerical analysis of the deviation between the coping and the preparation are performed producing, in this case, interesting results. At the margin the fit was measured to be within 38 microns, which from recent literature would indeed suggest a good fit. Away from the margin the fit rises as high as 120 microns (0.12mm), however this doesn’t seem to affect the perceived quality of the fit even though this would exceed the cement thickness that would normally be expected.


Errors identified as colour coded 'pins' across the tooth
Errors identified as colour coded 'pins' across the tooth


Certainly as the use of CADCAM technology in the dental market continues to increase so to will the ability to quantify accuracy. Furthermore by applying the latest CADCAM technology to the dental market we expect to see further improvements in process accuracy in the areas where it is most appropriate.