King Saud University Journal of Dental Sciences (2013) 4, 1720

King Saud University

King Saud University Journal of Dental Sciences

www.ksu.edu.sa
www.sciencedirect.com

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Shear bond strength of three silicone lining materials bonded

to heat-cured denture resin
Alaaa M. Salloum

Department of Removable Prosthodontics, Faculty of Dental Medicine, Damascus University, Syrian Arab Republic
Received 27 October 2011; accepted 9 June 2012
Available online 8 December 2012

KEYWORDS
Adhesion properties;
Silicone lining materials;
Complete dentures

Abstract This research compared the adhesive strength of three resilient denture lining materials
cured with two different curing modes: autopolymerized (Mollosil plus, GC Reline Soft), and conventional laboratory processing (Molloplast-B); bonded to heat-cured acrylic resin. The ndings
showed that all the lining materials were acceptable for clinical use; there were no statistically signicant differences among the bond strengths of the studied silicone materials. However, the bond
strength became higher when Molloplast-B was applied to unpolymerized polymethyl methacrylate
PMMA and processed together than it was applied to polymerized PMMA.
 2012 King Saud University. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Soft denture lining materials have been used in dentistry for
more than a century; the earliest soft liner was the soft natural
rubber and it was applied by Twichell in 1869 [16]. One of the
rst synthetic resins developed in 1945 as a soft liner was a
plasticized polyvinyl resin [12], followed by the introduction
of silicones in 1958 [5].
Soft denture liners provide an even distribution of the functional load on the denture-bearing area and avoid load stress
concentrations [16]; and they are widely used as a cushion on
* Tel.: +963 11 5631848, mobile: +963 933 490577; fax: +963 11
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the intaglio surface of dentures in the management of traumatized oral mucosa, ridge atrophy, bony undercuts, bruxism,
xerostomia, edentulous arches opposing natural dentition, congenital oral defects requiring obturation, and for improving the
retention of the dentures by engaging undercuts [16,6,7] and,
[20]. However, these materials have several problems associated
with their use. One of the more serious problems with soft denture liners is the failure of adhesion between the soft denture
liner and the denture base [3,18].
In spite of the similar bond mechanisms, the clinical practice
reveals that the bond failure of cold-cured silicone-based lining
material to acrylic denture base is more likely to occur than the
bond failure of heat-cured denture base. On the other hand,
some studies [2,8] and, [4] illustrated that bond strength became
higher when Molloplast-B was applied to unpolymerized polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) and processed together than it
was applied to polymerized PMMA; others [9] conrmed the
reverse. Bonding of resilient lining materials to PMMA denture
base material has been evaluated by several investigators using
tensile, peeling, and shearing tests [14,8,10,19] and, [17]. The
purpose of this study was to compare the shear bond strength

2210-8157  2012 King Saud University. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ksujds.2012.11.003

18

A.M. Salloum

of three silicone soft denture liners (Mollosil plus, GC Reline

Soft, Molloplast-B); and to compare the measured bond
strengths of Molloplast-B to those obtained by packing this
material against PMMA denture base acrylic resin dough.
2. Materials and methods
The resilient denture lining materials involved in this study
represent two different curing modes: autopolymerization
[Mollosil plus (DETAX, Ettligen-Germany), GC Reline Soft
(GC Corporation, Tokyo, Japan)], and conventional laboratory processing [Molloplast-B (DETAX, Ettligen-Germany)],
and the denture base material was heat-curing acrylic resin
[RODEX, Mulazzano (LO), Italy].
Shear adhesive strength was evaluated using a simple overlap-joint model. Shear specimens consisted of soft denture lining material with dimensions of (10 10 3) mm. The denture
lining materials were bonded to two plates of acrylic resin,
each (50 10 3) mm, (Fig. 1).
RODEX PMMA denture base material was packed into
performed molds (50 503) mm to make the acrylic resin
plates (Fig. 2).
The acrylic resin plates were then invested in Silicone Putty
(Zetaplus, Zhermak, Italy), together with glass spacers
(10 10 3) mm to provide space for the soft lining materials
after their removal (Fig. 3). Silicone primer was applied to the
acrylic bond surface, and the manufacturers instructions were
followed for packing and curing the liners.
The number of shearing specimens was ve for each soft
lining material in addition to additional ve specimens which
were fabricated by processing Molloplast-B against unpolymerized PMMA. The additional Molloplast-B specimens
were prepared by investing two wax plates, each (50
10 3) mm, bonded to a Teon plate with dimensions of

Figure 1

(30 10 3) mm (spacer) in 50:50 stone and plaster mix.

The acrylic resin dough was packed into the space which resulted during wax plate removal, then the Teon spacers were
removed to provide space for Molloplast-B.
The samples were tested by using the universal testing machine (DY-34 Adamel Lhomargy, France) (Fig. 4). Samples
were tested at a crosshead speed of 40 mm per minute until

Figure 3

Shear specimen.
Figure 4

Figure 2

Silicone mold.

The copper mold.

Universal testing machine.

Figure 5

Shearing test.

Shear bond strength of three silicone lining materials bonded to heat-cured denture resin
the liner material was separated from the acrylic plates (Fig. 5).
The maximum force indicating the point of failure by separation was recorded. Surfaces of bond failure were evaluated by
using an explorer for determining the type of failure (cohesive
or adhesive).
Mean values of stress needed for the separation were compared for statistically signicant differences at the 95% condence level by using ANOVA.
3. Results
The means of bonding strength measurements of the three
resilient liners and the type of failure are shown in Table 1.
A two-way analysis of variance was used to analyze the results. Statistical analysis is summarized in Table 2.
4. Discussion
Shear test specimens of this study were based on the simple lab
design described by Al-Athel and Jagger [1]. Evaluation of
bond strength was carried out with shear bond tests, because
the forces that the lining material is clinically exposed to are
more closely related to shear and tear tests [13].
The results of this study indicated that the force for failure
was higher than 0.59 MPa for all three materials tested. It has
been reported that 0.45 MPa (4.5 kg/cm2) would be satisfactory for clinical use of the resilient lining materials [8]. Considering this only criterion, all three materials were acceptable for
clinical use. Statistical analysis did not reveal signicant differences between the bond strength of the laboratory processed
material and of the autopolymerized materials. The adhesion
of silicone-based soft lining materials (heat and cold cured)
to processed acrylic resin depends upon the use of a volatile
solvent which softens the denture base surface. Once the sol-

Table II

Comparative statistical study (SPSS 16).

a = 0.05

Material

Mo

Mo
GC
M
Mcc
*

GC

Mcc

0.352

0.548
0.277

0.001*
0.004*
0.002*

19

vent evaporates, the silicone molecules penetrate into the

PMMA matrix, achieving mechanical union during the curing
stage of processing [11]. For Molloplast-B, this study demonstrated a signicant increase in bond strength when the soft lining material was processed against unpolymerized PMMA.
This nding suggests the possibility of formation of an intimate contact with a diffuse boundary, and this was conrmed
by the SEM results [2]. The results of this study agree with
those of [8] that studied the adhesion of Molloplast-B soft lining material and revealed that the bond strength improves by
applying Molloplast-B to the dough stage of the PMMA base
and curing the two together. However, it disagrees with the
study of Kawano et al. [9] who demonstrated that the bond
strength is increased by applying Molloplast-B to polymerized
PMMA.
The clinical observations show that the adhesive properties
of heat-cured silicone-based lining material to acrylic denture
base are better than those of cold-cured silicone-based lining
material. These observations disagree with the results of this
study (no differences were recorded). The difference noticed
clinically between the adhesive properties of heat-cured
silicone-based lining material and cold-cured silicone-based
lining material may be resulted from the different conditions
of application, or may be related to the kind of denture base
polymer [15].
The type of failure observed in shear specimens tested were
cohesive failures, except for GC Reline Soft (43%). This result
indicates that the strength of GC Reline Soft is nearly equal to
its bond strength.
5. Conclusions
Within the limits of this study, the following conclusions were
made:
 The ndings revealed that all of the lining materials
were acceptable for clinical use.
 The results showed that there were no statistically signicant differences among the studied silicone
materials.
 Bond strengths improved by processing Molloplast-B
against unpolymerized PMMA.
References

Statistically signicant difference.

Table 1 Mean bond strengths (MPa) of resilient lining

materials bonded to PMMA and data on the type of bond
failure.
Material

Mean bond strength

(MPa) (N = 5)

Standard
deviation

Type of failure
(% Coh)

Mo
GC
M
Mcc

1.134
0.954
1.196
1.740

0.150
0.274
0.186
0.032

100
43
100
100

Mo, Mollosil plus; GC, GC Reline Soft; M, Molloplast-B; Mcc,

Molloplast-B processed against unpolymerized PMMA, Coh,
cohesive failure.

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