Surface Finishing Of Orthopaedic Implants And Medical Instruments

In the area of medical technology surface finish of work pieces is an important factor.  Component surfaces must be ground, smoothed and polished without risking their required shape and functionality.  The reasons for these requirements are hygiene and sterilization.

Vibratory Finishing

[caption id="attachment_3861" align="alignright" width="161"] Rotary Vibrator[/caption]

In order to fulfil this task, rotary or trough vibrators are typically used. The advantage is that the parts are completely embedded and freely floating in the grinding / polishing media. The media acts as a cushion against part-on-part contact ensuring an all-around surface finish without having to mount the parts on special work piece fixtures. Only extremely delicate special implants require such fixtures.

Drag Finishing

[caption id="attachment_3864" align="alignleft" width="135"] Drag Finishing System[/caption]

Where it is identified that work pieces should not touch each other during the grinding process, they can be mounted to special fixtures, which in turn are attached to the work stations / spindles of the drag finisher.  For processing the surface the rotating work stations / spindles are immersed and "dragged“ through a work bowl filled with grinding or polishing media. The machine shown on the left hand side applies all these requirements.

This grinding and polishing process has two significant advantages; it does not require any costly and time-consuming equipment programming (as with a robot) and, above all, it offers absolute process consistency.

Components that can be finished:

• Knee: Femur and tibia
• Hip: stem and ball joint
• Ankle joint
• Shoulder joint
• Medical instruments
• Prosthetic components
• Dental forceps
• Bone plates and bone screws

For processing particularly small, detailed parts, a centrifugal disc finishing machine with highly intensive, fluid media / part movement is the ideal piece of equipment.  Examples of such parts are:

• Compression and pedicle screws
• Dental implants
• Dental screws
• Hand and elbow plates
• Femur screws
• Stents
• Vertebrae implants

Click here to see a range of components that have been finished this way

For further details and to download the brochure click here

Post written by

Sandra Banks

Personal Assistant / Digital Marketing