Preliminary study on direct manufacturing of customized lingual brackets by selective laser melting

In order to investigate the feasibility of direct manufacturing customized lingual brackets by selective laser melting,firstly,a 3-D scanner was used to acquire and reconstruct teeth model,which was based on the customized lingual brackets designing with 3-D software;then customized metal lingual brackets were directly manufactured with a self-developed selective laser melting apparatus;finally the slot width of the bracket on front teeth was measured.The analysis shows that the teeth model obtained from the three dimensional laser scanner can meet the requirements for customized lingual brackets designing,and customized metal lingual brackets that can well fitted with teeth model can be produced precisely by selective laser melting process.Compared with the designed value 0.460mm on CAD model,the slot width of the front teeth was measured 0.471mm±0.009mm.The research proves it is feasible to manufacture precise and well fitted customized metal lingual brackets by means of selective laser melting technique.