Impact behaviour of 3D printed cellular structures for mouthguard applications

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 12; no. 1; p. 4020
• Main Authors: Saunders, John, Lißner, Maria, Townsend, David, Petrinic, Nik, Bergmann, Jeroen
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 07.03.2022; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 639/166; 639/301; Equipment Design; Humanities and Social Sciences; Materials Testing; Mouth Protectors; multidisciplinary; Printing, Three-Dimensional; Science; Science (multidisciplinary)
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-08018-1

Ethylene-Vinyl Acetate (EVA) is the most popular material for manufacturing mouthguards. However, EVA mouthguards are problematic, for example inconsistent thicknesses across the mouthguard. Additive manufacturing provides a promising solution to this problem, as it can manufacture mouthguards with a greater precision. This paper compares the energy dissipation of EVA, the current material used for mouthguards, to various designs of a 3D printed material, some of which contain air cells. Impact testing was carried out at three different strain rates. The Split-Hopkinson bar was used for medium and high strain rate tests, and an Instron test rig was used for low strain rate testing. The best performing design dissipated 25% more energy than EVA in the medium and high strain rate testing respectively while the low strain rate testing was inconclusive. This research has shown that additive manufacturing provides a viable method of manufacturing mouthguards. This opens up the opportunity for embedding electronics/sensors into additive manufactured mouthguards.