T.S. Vinoth kumar
Sri Ramachandra University, India
Title: Influence of cryogenic treatment on hardness of Nickel Titanium alloy used for rotary endodontic instrument – An Invitro study
Biography
Biography: T.S. Vinoth kumar
Abstract
Cryogenic treatment is a one time supplementary thermal treatment where alloys are subjected to sub-zero temperature to improve their metallurgical properties. Nickel Titanium alloy used for manufacturing of rotary endodontic instruments possess superelastic property due to which they must be machined rather than twisted. The combination of surface defects during manufacturing and lower hardness of the alloy results in compromised cutting efficiency of endodontic instruments within the root canals. A recent approach deals with the use of Nickel Titanium alloy that possess a mixture of austenite and martensite phase at body temperature in order to have extreme felxibility without the conventional shape memory. The pupose of this study was to evaluate the effect of different cryogenic treatment parameters on the hardness of Nickel Titanium alloy. Accordingly, a similar virgin alloy was procured in the form of sheets. 15 samples were prepared from the sheet using electrical discharge maching process. They were randomly divided into five groups (four experimental groups based on the soaking time and temperature parameters of cryogenic treatment and a control group; n=3). The metal samples in each experimental group were subjected to vickers hardness testing following the cryogenic treatment and compared with that of the control group. The data were tabulated and the results were statistically analysed using SPSS software.
