Veneer retention of preveneered primary stainless steel crowns after crimping

The purpose of this study was to determine if crimping the lingual aspect of commercially available, preveneered, anterior stainless steel primary crowns affects the fracture resistance of the veneer facings.

Twenty-six anterior NuSmile crowns (size A1) were divided into 2 groups: group 1 served as the control, and group 2 was manually crimped evenly on the lingual cervical portion. All crowns were cemented onto a screw-mounted resin core duplicated from a manually prepared Kilgore tooth and tested under compression. Recorded were fracture resistance, percent of veneer facing loss, and fracture to the gingival margin. Differences between the control and experimental groups were analyzed by independent t test and chi-square (alpha=0.05).

The mean shear force required to fracture the veneers of the noncrimped crowns was 510.11 N (+/-79.66 SD), and 511.02 N (+/-62.37) for the crimped crowns. The mean percentage of veneer facing removed in the noncrimped crowns was 33% (+/-12.18), and 43% (+/-14.30) in the crimped crowns. No significant difference in shear strengths (P=.970) and in percentage of veneer loss (P=.063) was shown between crimped and noncrimped crowns. A mean of 8% of the noncrimped crowns and 23% of the crimped crowns had veneers fracturing to the gingival margin. The chi-square test showed no significant difference (P=.297).

The veneer resistance to fracture for the crimped crowns was comparable to noncrimped crowns. The crimped crowns, however, were associated with greater veneer surface area loss.