An appropriate test to evaluate the structural integrity of composites, compomers, glassionomers or resin-modified glassionomers is three-body wear testing. In this mode the wear machine simulates food-caused (CFA) wear. This method has been shown to provide high-resolution data for the determination of small differences in and differences in matrix-to-filler coherence of resin composites. A study like this is here. A correlation of the machine's CFA wear with clinical results is here.

Schematic representation of the various steps in the wear experiment. Upper left: Sample wheel with some specimens cured and glued in the wheel.
 
Surface finishing was done by mounting the sample wheel on the fixed axis of the wear machine and a diamond grinding wheel on the other axis, which could slowly be moved into the direction of the sample wheel. The grinding procedure was carried out under water with grinding wheels with grits up to grit 1000. In this way the sample wheel was finished to a perfect cylindrical shape. The sample wheel was then immediately subjected to the wear-in run and always kept wet from this moment on. Middle: Antagonist wheel and sample wheel rolling over each other in a slurry of rice and millet seed shells at a pH of 7.0 for 3-body wear. The antagonist wheel was pressed against the sample wheel by a spring and the surface velocity was adjusted as to obtain a slip rate. Upper right: Profile tracings from one unworn reference to the other across the worn surface to measure wear.

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