Recently, my assistant, in an effort to save money, ordered a bag of burs for the office. Shortly after we started to use these less expensive carbide burs, I noticed a big problem. They would constantly break. This continued breakage interrupted the procedure I was performing and was, in effect, costing me money as I was going through more burs. So I started doing some research on bur strength.
Carbide dental burs are subject to rigorous and strenuous forces. These forces are applied when cutting natural teeth and metal crowns, making the burs prone to breakage. Tungsten carbide burs are very hard but they are brittle. Broken burs are not just an interruption to the procedure but present a patient risk. When a bur breaks, there is the potential for the patient to aspirate the broken bur piece. Therefore, minimizing carbide bur breakage is important to me.
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