How to Process Custom Trays before Printing?

CHITUBOX Dental is a digital slicing software specifically developed for dental 3D printing, dedicated to advancing the digital transformation of dentistry and making dental 3D printing more efficient. For custom trays, CHITUBOX Dental helps dental professionals efficiently complete pre-print processing. In previous tutorials, we covered the processing methods for orthodontic models, working models, surgical guides and temporary C&B. Now, let’s explore the slicing workflow for custom trays.

If you are not yet familiar with the settings in CHITUBOX Dental, you can refer to the Primer tutorial "What to Do Before Model Preparation in CHITUBOX Dental?" to learn how to complete initial setup steps after launching the software, including printer and material selection, print parameter configuration, and model import.

Let’s begin learning the processing workflow for custom trays.

Custom Trays

Custom trays are essential tools in dental treatment. They are personalized trays tailored to the patient’s dental arch morphology, designed to accurately cover the patient’s arch for precise impression-taking, treatment assistance, or support. Compared to traditional standardized trays, custom trays account for factors such as arch length, curvature, and height, offering better fit, improved comfort, and more accurate restoration outcomes.

Custom trays are used to hold silicone or alginate material for capturing impressions of the patient’s upper and lower teeth and dental arch. In practice, minor scaling of the printed model does not significantly impact its functionality, so custom trays do not require extremely high precision.

Manual Processing

Currently, CHITUBOX Dental’s automated processing function does not yet support the application of custom trays. We recommend users process them manually using the following workflow: Orientation → Support → Layout → Slicing.

Orientation

The positioning of custom trays on the build platform directly impacts print success rates, surface quality, and printing efficiency. Tray orientation should follow these basic principles:

• Function First: The functional area of the tray, that is to say, the intaglio surface used for holding the impression, should be oriented to require as few supports as possible. This avoids affecting the functional surface during support removal.

• Tilt Adjustment: Depending on the application scenario, the tray’s orientation can be adjusted to meet efficient production needs.

  For example:

  • In dental clinics, to meet the need for rapid printing of a single case, the tilt angle can be reduced or the model can be placed flat to minimize print height and ensure quick completion.

  • In dental labs, to accommodate high-volume printing, the tilt angle can be increased to allow more models to be printed in a single batch.

CHITUBOX Dental’s Auto Orientation function can quickly orient custom trays, helping position the intaglio surface upward. Users can combine the basic orientation principles and manually rotate models for further adjustments after auto-orientation. For batch rotation, select all models with similar or identical orientations and rotate one to synchronize the adjustments for all.

Support

CHITUBOX Dental’s auto-support function can quickly add support to tray models. Since custom trays are generally lightweight but large in size, it is recommended to use light and dense support structures. Light supports are easier to remove and leave smaller marks, reducing post-processing polishing time. Higher support density ensures better adhesion and stability during printing.

Users can customize support parameters by clicking the middle button on the right side of the support configuration. For general custom trays, the following parameters are recommended:

• Auto Support Point Spacing: 3mm

• Auto Support Trunk Spacing: 6mm

• Upper-end Diameter of Top-section: 0.2mm

Users can fine-tune these parameters based on the actual size and shape of the tray model.

Layout

Finally, use CHITUBOX Dental’s Auto Layout function to achieve compact nesting of custom tray models, efficiently utilizing the build platform space.

Since custom trays do not require extremely high precision, the layer height can be set between 0.15–0.2mm to reduce printing time. This is particularly beneficial for labs engaged in mass production, as it shortens the production cycle.

After configuring and confirming the slicing parameters, click Slice on the lowe right corner to complete the model slicing. Finally, click Save to store the file locally or on a storage device, or select Send to Printer to directly transfer the file to the printer and initiate printing.

The above describes our recommended workflow for processing custom trays in CHITUBOX Dental. If you have different insights, feel free to share them with us at marketing@dental.chitubox.com.