Viscoelastic properties of elastomeric impression materials: polysulphide, silicone and polyether rubbers.

Creep compliance measurements were shown to be effective in characterizing the elastic, retarded elastic, and viscous properties of polysulphide, silicone, and polyether impression materials. The test is particularly valuable in that the creep compliance was independent of load, allowing the mechanical properties to be represented by a single total creep compliance curve which can be used to determine the various creep components. The total recovered compliance was shown to be independent of time provided the polymerization had progressed sufficiently before testing was done. The retarded elastic and viscous compliances contributed proportionally to the total creep compliance and thus did not affect the rankings of materials. The viscous compliance of polysulphide A decreased enough after 1 h so that the creep compliance of A and D were not different. The creep compliance measurements showed that the polysulphide materials were the most viscoelastic followed by silicone and polyether impression materials. The polyether was the most nearly ideal elastic material but it had a flexibility comparable to heavy body polysulphide. Of particular interest was the observation that polyether with thinner in ratios up to 1 : 1 by length had no practical effect on the viscoelastic properties.