3D Printed Mouth Guard Manufacturing

3D printing (aka additive manufacturing) has been around since 1987 when 3D Systems invented the first SLA 3D printer.  These machines took the same path as computers did, in that they were initially the size of refrigerators, they had many mechanical failures, and they were very expensive.  The machines initially sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars, and only big corporations had the deep pockets to purchase and tinker with them.  Now that there are more affordable options, like desktop printers, 3D printing has become a common place alternative in the manufacturing process.  Within 500 days the hearing aid industry switched over to 3D printing as a manufacturing process, and those who didn't make the switch, and stuck to traditional manufacturing, fell by the wayside.[1]   Could this be the next phase for  custom mouth guard manufacturing?  Here at Damage Control we believe it will be, and we are constantly keeping up with training, trends and materials, in hopes to be leaders in this movement.  Although the dental industry (i.e dentists) have been very slow to adopt 3D scanning technologies, many dental laboratories across the globe have adopted 3D scanning, additive and subtractive manufacturing into their production processes.  See our previous article on 3D Scanning for 3D Printed Mouth Guard Manufacturing to see how Damage Control has adopted this technology into their manufacturing process.  There are a variety resins available for dental labs to 3D print crowns, night guards, retainers, dentures, and the list goes on.  Below are some resins available by 3D Systems:

[1] D’Aveni, R (2015)  The 3D Printing Revolution. Harvard Business Review, May 2015 issue.