Evaluation of corrosion behaviour and some mechanical properties of silver-rich, gamma 2 free amalgam.

Corrosion behaviour, creep resistance, compressive and tensile strength and hardness of a newly developed silver-rich commercial amalgam were investigated in order to evaluate its performance, as compared with three high copper amalgams, namely; admixed, unicompositional and Pd-enriched. The results have shown that Ag-rich amalgam was superior in corrosion behaviour, compressive and tensile strength. Creep values were comparable to those of Pd-enriched amalgam, whereas hardness measurements of the latter were significantly higher. The results were analysed on a compositional and microstructural bases.