The aim of this work is to fabricate and characterize a prototype for a fixing plate bone implant. The prototype was performed by extrusion 3D printing and solid state sintering using pellets of Ti64 powders. Sintering analysis was carried out on individual screw holes by dilatometry tests. After that, printing fixing plates were consolidated in a horizontal furnace under argon atmosphere. Microstructure characterization was performed by computed microtomography and scanning electron microscopy. Results indicates that sintering temperature drives the densification of the screw holes, obtaining an interconnected porosity when samples are sintered at temperatures lower than 1200 °C. Then, it was possible to obtain a fixing plate with a large pore size distribution between 11 and 765 μm. After sintering of the fixing plate, no defects were detected and the shape was similar to the one printed. Simulations of flow throughout the 3D real microstructure suggest that corporal fluids could be transport inside the fixing plate to ensure a good vascularization, which could improve the osseointegration. It is concluded that 3D printing extrusion is a promissory processing route to develop bone implants with complex shapes and tailored porosity by extrusion 3D printing.
González-Pedraza et al. (Sat,) studied this question.
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