Amos Dudley, student at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, has created his own set of teeth aligners for a perfect smile using 3D scanning and printing technology. Warning: he does not recommend others to try this themselves!
When Dudley was confronted with the high cost for aligners to straighten out his teeth, he decided to tackle the problem himself as he had access to 3D printing systems at NJIT.
After taking a mould of his teeth he filled it with liquid Permastone to create a cast and then take a 3D scan of it. Based on the scans, he used CAD software to design several aligners, each featuring a further step in the treatment. “I measured the total distance of travel, and divided it by the maximum recommended distance a tooth can travel per aligner. Each frame of animation was baked into a new STL model,” Dudley explains.
After 3D printing the models on the Stratasys Dimension 1200es 3D printer, a vacuum forming machine was used to create the actual aligners. Finally, Dudley unveils his before and after images:
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