At Simply Crown and Bridge, we strongly recommend you choose metal-free options when enhancing or restoring your smile. Here is why.
Prevents gum recession
The delicate tissues of your mouth do not always react well to even the best metals used in dentistry and in some cases gum recession can occur.
However it is a very different story when metal free crowns are fitted. Tissues become healthier, and some re-growth can occur to form a natural tooth tissue border, with no more unsightly black lines. Gum recession is very rare when using all-ceramic metal free crowns and bridges.
More natural-looking
They are as strong as any old style metal based crown or bridge, but with no metal to block light, they have a natural translucence that closely mimics a natural tooth.




Ceramic
Full ceramic restorations are increasingly becoming the most popular choice of treatment. Thanks to advances in dental materials, ceramic crowns and bridges are more durable and long-lasting.
In the laboratory, we see upward of three patients a day, many of whom want to replace their old porcelain bonded crowns with new ceramic units. The main reason for this is the typical gum recession and black line associated with porcelain bonded crowns.
Even after many years we do not see gum recession and certainly no black lines when all ceramics are used. Please see the photos to the left showing how successful metal free can be.
IPS e.max
IPS e.max is a system that has completely revolutionised the way we think about aesthetic crown and bridge work. Quite simply, no other system comes close to the combination of outstanding natural beauty and high mechanical strength. This combination gives us amazing flexibility enabling its usage for a vast variety of restorations.
E.max is a revolutionary glass ceramic, when pressed under high temperature and pressure, it can be formed into immensely strong and beautiful shapes and colours. We use this property to produce a wide variety of dental appliances which perfectly match natural teeth. It’s amazing in strength even in very thin sections, making it perfect for veneers.
The case below was created by Simply Crown and Bridge using ultra fine e.max veneers. The patient had suffered some loss of tooth tissue due to erosion, which we replaced with no cutting of the tooth being required. The finished e.max veneers were only 0.2 to 0.3mm thick.



Zirconia
Often known within the dental industry as Zirconia, this is a material that causes some confusion. There are many brands – inVizion, Lava and Cercon to name but a few. So what are the differences? In essence very few. All the major manufacturers have high quality production facilities, which is essential to produce good quality Zirconia for milling. At Simply Crown and Bridge, we use only the major brands and have priced our work accordingly.
We use Zirconia predominantly for large span bridges which are beyond the scope of e.max, and for implant abutments.
Why don’t we use such a strong material all the time?
In brief, it is not as aesthetic as e.max. The crystalline structure of Zirconium oxide tends to reflect light, making the crown higher value than a natural tooth. Using various modifiers, we can work around these problems, but it is always better to start from the right place, which are the natural low value characteristics of e.max.
However, when strength is the outstanding concern, we use Zirconia and the results can still be amazingly aesthetic as can be seen.