Will we ever see a silent dental handpiece? This piece was sparked by a Dentist friend interested in, hypothetically, what it would require to create a silent dental handpiece powered by the perfect dental turbine. Lets design one. Your comments would be greatly appreciated.
A major source of noise emitted from any dental turbine, like a combustion engine, is from air or exhaust gases being expelled after use. Hence, the necessity for mufflers on automobiles. Most air driven handpieces currently have 4 lines (commonly referred to as 4 hole Midwest). The largest hole is exhaust, the smaller one next to it is the intake (air supply), and the two little ones are chip air and water. If you were to apply air to the intake without covering the exhaust, you would get much more noise. The hose on your unit helps dampen the noise as well.
Manufacturers making advances toward noise reduction are doing so, in part, by dampening air exhaust through various means, and sealing the handpiece head. Do understand, however, that good exhaust flow is required for proper operation. Dampening too much lessens efficiency, similar to sticking a potato in an automobile exhaust. One idea might be to have the unit's exhaust hose exposed to a vacuum, or something less than atmospheric pressure, which might help to expell the air more quietly. Of course a vacuum might require a reinforced hose, as a normal hose could collapse from the atmospheric pressure outside.
Much of the other noise generated comes from turbine vibration. I believe there is a term called "carnot" which refers to a perfect engine, ie.. 100% efficient. The perfect turbine would be completely without vibration,which in a perfect world would require:
1. Frictionless dental bearings (not yet invented)
2. Perfectly concentric dental rotor
3. Perfectly balanced dental turbine impeller
All combined into one component and fitted to the dental handpiece head such that 100% of supplied air is converted to output watts.
Of course, that's just the handpiece and turbine. We haven't put dental bur to tooth yet.
An absolutely razor sharp diamond bur, forged and tempered to rival a Samurai Sword, and cooled with perfectly atomized water spray from multiple ports providing 100% heat removal efficiency. Did you know spray pattern directly effects cutting efficiency?
Check the following link to ADA:
Also, check this link. Focus is noise and hearing loss, but contains references to causes of the noise.
Again, comments would be greatly appreciated.
Hi Friends,
ReplyDeleteDental turbine comprises a rotor which is rotatable accommodated in a housing having an outlet opening for propellant air which causes the rotor to rotate. It is ready to install in your dental handpieces. Thanks a lot.
a silent handpiece is possible with a redesigned turbine that does not depend upon interrupted air flow (i.e. paddle design)....there is a unique design that uses a continuous air flow, I have detailed engineering drawings. neil5557@hotmail.com
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