Fatigue Testing of Dental Bridges on Selected Examples

The paper presents example tests of the functional quality of selected designs of dental bridges. These were: porcelain bridges on a metal base (cobalt based alloy), porcelain bridges on a zirconia base (zirconia ceramic – Zirkon Zahn), and full zirconia bridges (Zirkon Zahn). For the purpose of the study, durability of bridges in cyclic fatigue testing was adopted as a measure of their quality. The tests were carried out on a Zwick Roell Z010 universal testing machine. They consisted in cyclic loading and unloading of dental bridges mounted on gypsum models at a loading force of F= 400 [N] and a frequency of load of f= 1 [Hz]. Each bridge was subjected to a cycle of 7200 loads. The results show that there are no significant differences in the functional quality of the bridges.