Microstructures and Mechanical Properties of Laser-Sintered Commercially Pure Ti and Ti-6Al-4V Alloy for Dental Applications
To apply laser-sintered titanium (Ti) materials to dental prostheses with a three-dimensional structure such as partial dentures, we examined the microstructures and mechanical properties of commercially pure (CP) Ti grade (G) 2 annealed after laser sintering and laser-sintered (as-built) Ti-6Al-4V alloy. The tensile and fatigue properties of CP Ti G 2 annealed at 700 °C for 2 h after laser sintering were close to those of wrought CP Ti G 2 annealed at the same temperature after hot forging. The ultimate tensile strengths (σUTS) of 90°- and 0°-direction-built CP Ti G 2 rods after laser sintering 10 times were 553 and 576 MPa and the total elongations (TE) of these rods were 26% and 28%, respectively. The fatigue strengths (σFS) at 107 cycles of the 90°- and 0°-direction-built CP Ti G 2 rods after laser sintering 10 times were ~320 and ~365 MPa, respectively. The ratio σFS/σUTS was in the range of 0.5–0.7. The changes in the chemical composition and mechanical properties after laser sintering 10 times were negligible. The fatigue strength of the laser-sintered Ti-6Al-4V alloy was ~600 MPa, which was close to that of wrought Ti-6Al-4V alloy. These findings indicate that the laser-sintered CP Ti and Ti-6Al-4V alloy can also be applied in dental prostheses similarly to laser-sintered Co–Cr–Mo alloy. In particular, it was clarified that laser sintering using CP Ti G 4 powder is useful for dental prostheses.