RESUMO
The purpose of this study was to evaluate the influence of the lining design of a soft denture liner on its cushioning effect, using a free drop test and an accelerometer. The peak instantaneous acceleration value was computed. The materials tested were SuperSoft(R) (SS), Kurepeet-Dough(R) (KD), and Molloplast-B(R) (MB). Soft denture liners 2 mm in thickness were placed in test denture bases using three different configurations. Specimens were tested at 24 h and at 180 days after storage in distilled water at 37 degrees C. A three-way ANOVA was used to analyse the data (P=0.05) and Tukey intervals were computed. It was found that all three materials were effective in reducing the impact force. The lining design that had the soft denture liner extended to the periphery of the denture base demonstrated the greatest shock absorbability of all the tested designs. A silicone denture liner using lining design 1 was the most effective in reducing the shock transmitted to the denture bases.