C&B: a Digital World

No other specialty has been impacted by CAD/CAM technology more than C&B. Digitization has transformed this department over the last decade, allowing laboratory owners to streamline, simplify and improve laboratory processes.

From expanded indications to software upgrades and increased material options, manufacturers are continuously striving to improve laboratory capabilities and product offerings. Here's a look at some key developments:

Digitizing of the manual waxup process. Kiss your wax spatulas goodbye: wax printers use additive technology to build up waxups layer by layer, and many CAD/CAM milling systems now mill copings and frameworks from wax or resin blanks that are then cast using traditional methods. In the pressables arena, some systems feature a file-splitting option that allows you to design a virtual coping or framework and full contour simultaneously, output them in two different materials, then invest and press...