Contact angles of contemporary type 3 impression materials.

The aim of this study was to investigate the contact angles of six different type 3 dental impression materials (DIMs). Contact angles (n = 3) were continuously determined for 20 seconds after placing 4 MuL of deionized water onto a thin layer (50 Mum) of freshly mixed DIM (polyvinyl siloxane, C-silicone, polyether, and hybrid DIMs). Data were subjected to parametric statistics (P < .05). Contact angles ranged from 76.1 +/- 5.6 degrees to 119.5 +/- 1.8 degrees at 0 seconds and from 11.7 +/- 1.6 degrees to 74.7 +/- 1.1 degrees at 5 seconds after droplet deposition. The siloxanes showed significantly higher contact angles at 0 and 5 seconds compared to all other DIMs tested (P < .05). The newly introduced DIMs with a polyether backbone showed promising results regarding their hydrophilicity.