Porcelain Crowns
A porcelain crown is used to completely cover a weakened, damaged or cracked tooth above the gum line and protect it. Coloured and shaped to match your own teeth, crowns can look and feel almost exactly like a natural tooth.
A dental crown may be needed to:
- Protect a weak tooth (for example, from decay) from breaking or to hold together parts of a cracked tooth
- Restore a broken tooth or a severely worn down tooth
- Cover and support a tooth with a large filling and not much tooth remaining
- Hold a dental bridge in place
- Cover misshaped or severely discolored teeth
- Cover a dental implant
- Cover a tooth treated with a root canal
Porcelain fused to metal crowns.
Porcelain fused to metal crowns can be referred to as full-cast crowns which has porcelain fused on most or all parts of the tooth. They are a hybrid between porcelain and metal crowns. The entire crown has a metal layer underlying and porcelain / ceramic on top of it.
The metal framework is thin, strong, and perfectly fits the prepared teeth. It’s a combination of different types of alloys which are designed such that they bond very well with the porcelain. Metal alloys with a high melting temperature are used to fuse porcelain to the surface and preventing the metal from melting. This ensures the porcelain to bond without changing its color.
When the tooth is prepared for such crowns, a large part of the tooth tissue gets removed making space for porcelain as well as the metal.