Digital and printed models.
A digital case can proceed without a physical model. Some cases are better for having one, and knowing which is worth more than a general policy either way.
Modelless work
For a single unit or a straightforward quadrant, design and production can run entirely from the file. The restoration is checked against the digital model, milled and finished, and never sits on a physical die.
This removes the model-making chain — pouring, sectioning, trimming, die spacing — and with it a set of small errors that had to be compensated for empirically.
For most routine restorative work it is the sensible default.
When a physical model earns its place
Where proximal contacts need assessing by hand against the adjacent teeth. Where emergence and contour need judging against a tissue surface rather than a mesh. Where several units are being made and their relationship to each other has to be verified physically.
Also where a restoration will be tried against existing work, or where a case involves a removable prosthesis and the two have to be coordinated.
Say if you want a model produced. It is a decision rather than an automatic step, and a case where you know contacts will be critical is worth flagging.
Soft tissue models
A model with a removable gingival mask shows how a restoration emerges through tissue rather than only how it sits on a die. For implant work in the aesthetic zone that is frequently decisive.
It lets the emergence profile be assessed and adjusted against something resembling the clinical situation, and it makes the relationship between the restoration and the tissue visible in a way geometry alone does not.
Worth requesting on any anterior implant case.
Printed against milled models
Printed models are the norm for digital cases and are dimensionally reliable when produced and post-processed properly. Milled models are used in some workflows and behave slightly differently in terms of surface and durability.
Both are working models rather than archival objects. A printed model stored for years may not be dimensionally identical to the file it came from, which is an argument for treating the file as the record rather than the model.
For a remake, the archived file is the better starting point.
Die systems
Where individual dies are needed — for margin work under magnification, or for checking internal fit — they can be printed as removable dies in a model base, exactly as a conventional case would be sectioned.
Say if you want removable dies. Some cases genuinely need them and some do not, and a solid model is faster where they are unnecessary.
Storage and remakes
A printed model is a working object rather than an archive. Resin models can change dimensionally over time, so a model stored for years is not necessarily identical to the file it came from.
For a remake, the archived file is the better starting point — provided the preparation is genuinely unchanged.
This is one of the practical advantages of digital records generally: the reference persists in a form that does not degrade, which a stone or resin model does not.
What to specify
Whether you want a model at all, whether it should carry a soft tissue mask, and whether you want removable dies.
For implant cases, whether analogues should be included in the model. For cases involving a removable prosthesis, whether the model needs to accommodate it.
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Digital scans and conventional impressions are both accepted. Cases move by UPS and Purolator, and Fairmont works with practices throughout British Columbia and across Canada.