Determination of tangential and normal components of oral forces.

Oral forces applied to human teeth during biting and mastication are normally described in the literature only in terms of their axial components. The purpose of this study was to fully determine the spatial characteristics of the oral resultant force - its normal and tangential components - for a given individual. A load cell was especially manufactured to measure oral force and was temporarily implanted as a prosthetic device in the dental arch of a volunteer, replacing his missing upper first molar.