3D Printing technology has become a standard in the medical and dental industry. It is now possible to smile with confidence with 3D printed aligners. Dr Rohan Tari, MDS - Orthodontics, Beyond Health Dental Center, Mumbai, approached Imaginarium for a solution to manufacture custom-made aligners in-house.

The Challenge:

Dr Tari was looking for an in-house 3D printing machine that could print over 100 custom aligners per week in the house and not be dependent on any 3rd party. 

The Solution:

Formlabs Form 3B 3D Printer 

Material:

Draft Resin - Prints four times faster than other standard material

Straightening Teeth Beautifully with 3D Printed Aligners

Aligners, an effective alternative to braces, have an abundant number of benefits over traditional braces. Clear Aligners appear invisible, which helps in concealing the fact that a person is undergoing orthodontic treatment. In addition to this, patients who have had traditional braces always found it challenging to maintain their oral health entirely. The use of aligners is one of the aptest examples of dentistry in action.

With experience of over 12 years in Mumbai, Dr Tari, MD- Orthodontics, Certified Lingual Orthodontist, and a clear aligner specialist was looking forward to technical advances that would help him save cost and time for his patients. He had an average requirement of over 100 3D printed aligners every week and was looking for an in-house solution for the same.

Cost-effective Solution from Imaginarium

Imaginarium Solutions aims to provide holistic, end-to-end solutions for all our clients right from hardware, software, materials and human expertise. 3D Printing technology takes the efficiency of the dental design onto the production stage.

Our experts at Imaginarium first penned down Dr Tari's exact requirement and then suggested the best solution to him. We understand that moving teeth is a complex process and must be done with utmost care. Being an industry leader, with 15+ years of experience in 3D Printing and serving more than 40 industries, our team presented Formlabs Form 3B to Dr Rohan Tari. Imaginarium have always been users of technology first. Having used Formlabs 3D printers consistently, we understand how it can boost dental application production and save time. The Form 3B is an advanced desktop 3D printer optimized for biocompatible materials. The suggested resin was the Draft resin for its speed. The parts printed with Draft Resin exhibit a smooth grey finish and high accuracy. Formlabs Form 3B 3D Printer exactly met Dr Tari's requirement and provided patient-specific solutions.

First, the custom mould was 3D printed, and then the aligners were manufactured through the thermoforming process.

The Complete Process

Orthodontic appliances like aligners are created in 6 simple steps. They are as follows:

• Scan - The patient’s dental anatomy was first scanned and uploaded to the dental software. 
• Import - The next step is importing the model into pre-form. This can be done for all the files together or separately too.
• Orient - In the third step, the manipulator rotates the scan and orient the occlusal surface up or away from the build platform.
• Trim - The next step is trimming extraneous data or even shortening the model if the need arises.
• Create Base - The final step before printing is to create the base. This is done by moving the slider to add additional height from the trimming plane to the model's base.  
• Print - The last step is to print the model. Here, the most significant advantage is that one can print the model horizontally for the fastest printing as well as near vertical that could pack more models to a single point.

Formlabs Form 3B was considered as a perfect option as the requirement of mass customisation was also met along with speed and accuracy.

What Made Dr Rohan Tari Choose Imaginarium?

Dr Rohan Tari visited Imaginarium in Mumbai. He was impressed with the technical knowledge and the support provided by the team. Custom aligners and many other 3D dental applications were printed right in front of him during the benchmarking process. The whole process from start to finish was completed in a concise span of time. At Imaginarium, we believe in providing our clients with complete 360-degree support. We provided Dr Tari with a live demo of Form Labs Form 3B and some of its applications apart from the benchmarking.

Dr Tari was not only impressed but also thrilled with the performance of Formlabs Form 3B. Additionally, our pre-sales and the post-sales team was always on toes to support him throughout the procedure. We promised full backing right from consultancy to customer care and ensured that we kept it. He said, “I have been using form 3B for 6 months for making aligner models in draft grey resin. The models printed are of outstanding accuracy and compatible with the thermoforming process. The printer is very user friendly for me as well as my staff. The WiFi feature helps me monitor as well as start the prints from my home or anywhere else. It prints 8-10 models in a span of 6 hours. It is perfect for a clinic and small dental lab, and I would recommend it.”

Dr Rohan Tari now manufactures customized parts for his patients and dentists looking for excellent quality aligners. No more, he has to be dependent on any 3rd party but produces his aligners in-house. Additionally, Imaginarium is also in talks with Dr Tari, how we could assist him further with other applications for his business of bringing brighter smiles to all his patients and clients.

If you are looking forward to expanding your in-house print production with Formlabs' industry-quality SLA and SLS 3D printers, then we are just a call away.