Fibre-reinforced and repaired PMMA denture base resin: Effect of placement on the flexural strength and load-bearing capacity

To measure the effect of placement of glass fibre mesh on the flexural strength and load bearing capacity of repaired polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) denture base resin. A total of 150 heat-polymerised acrylic resin specimens were fabricated with dimensions of 5 × 30 × 50 mm for flexural strength testing. Specimens were divided into 5 groups according to repair width and placement of the fibre mesh. Three groups (n = 90) had a repair width of 20 mm (including the control group), and two groups (n = 60) had a narrower repair width of 16 mm. Fibre mesh was either embedded at the neutral (bottom of the repair area) or tension (top of the repair area) zone of the specimen when subjected to flexural strength testing. Half of the specimens from each group were subjected to artificial ageing by thermocycling (5 °C and 55 °C, 30s dwell time) for 10,000 cycles to stimulate 12 months in vivo. All the specimens were stored in distilled water at 37 °C for 24 h prior to testing. The flexural strength of the specimen was obtained by three-point bend testing, and data were statistically analysed using ANOVA and post-hoc analysis (SPSS; significance level p