Dentsply Research & Development Corp.

Jeffrey E McGraw

Barry D Dehoff

Roger C Shue

Mark White

Vickie Reynolds

James McNulty

Andrew T Liu

Carlton L Grim

A prosthetic tooth having an enamel layer which has a zone of substantially constant thickness. This tooth is molded using a dental tooth mold part prepared by imaging a dental pattern of a prosthetic tooth shade layer and/or shader mold part outer surface, and forming the dental pattern in a mold by program directed milling. A family of prosthetic teeth is provided including a first tooth in a first set of teeth having a first overall labial length, and a first back length, and a second tooth in a second set of teeth having a second overall labial length, and a second back length. The invention provides a prosthetic incisor tooth including a tooth body having two generally symmetrical curved grooves between three curved ridges on the labial face of the body at the incisal end of the body. The grooves are deepest at the incisal end and extend substantially from the incisal edge to at least about 15 percent of the overall tooth length.

Prosthetic teeth and mold making therefor

A method of milling and polishing a set of tooth mold parts by milling a first and second tooth mold parts of a set of mold parts using a first and second tool path program, then polishing the mold parts using the first and second tool path program, to form polished mold parts adapted to form an enamel layer of a prosthetic tooth. A method is provided of molding artificial teeth each having a molded enamel layer and high definition labial striations, by milling and then polishing a set of at least three tooth mold parts in mold making material. The milling and polishing is directed by three milling programs which use data, representative of the surface of one of the tooth mold parts. The data is adapted by the milling program to direct the milling and polishing. The milling of each of the parts includes executing a first pass with a first mill and executing a second pass with a second mill. The first mill has a first mill end. The second mill has a second mill end, which is smaller in size than the first mill end. High definition artificial teeth having labial striations are repeatedly manufactured in the set of polished mold parts.

Prosthetic teeth and mold making and polishing therefor

A method for the making of a tooth mold which includes the steps of scanning the surface of a model of a tooth to obtain data on the three-dimensional surface locations of the model, processing the data in a CAD/CAM computer, and using the processed data to fabricate a tooth mold. The scanning step involves subjecting a rotating tooth model to radiant energy from a laser beam, receiving and translating reflections of the radiant energy into electronic signals, and digitizing the signals into data of the three-dimensional surface locations of the tooth model. The processing step involves translating the data, editing the data, creating a three-dimensional surface pattern of the tooth model, evaluating the surface pattern by visual analysis and comparison to known geometric values of the tooth model, and creating a tooth path program. Finally, the fabricating step involves using the tooth path program to direct a machine to mill a tooth mold and using the same program to direct a machine to finish-polish the mold.

Method of making a tooth mold

Growing community of inventors

Boiling Springs, PA, United States of America

Jeffrey E McGraw