Dental X-Ray Unit

Overview

A dental X-ray unit produces the radiographic images dentists use to see caries, bone level, and root anatomy hidden from direct view. This is a wall-mounted system that performs both intraoral exposures and panoramic imaging, in which a rotating arm sweeps an X-ray source and a digital detector around the patient's head to build a single flattened image of the whole dental arch. A digital CMOS detector replaces film, so the image appears on screen within seconds.

The system hangs from the Wall Column Mount, a wall-fixed telescopic column with a motorized height drive, and reaches the patient through the Articulating Extension Arm, a counterbalanced extension arm. X-rays are generated in the X-Ray Tubehead, an oil-filled, lead-shielded head holding the tube, high-voltage generator, and collimator. For panoramic exposures the tubehead and detector are carried in fixed opposition on the Rotating Panoramic Gantry, a motorized C-arm that orbits the patient. The patient is held still by the Patient Positioning Assembly assembly, the image is captured by the Digital CMOS Sensor, and exposures are run from the Control Panel.

How it works

Inside the tubehead a high-frequency generator board steps mains voltage up to 60–70 kVp and heats the tungsten filament. The heated filament boils off electrons, which the kilovoltage accelerates into the stationary tungsten anode; the abrupt deceleration emits an X-ray beam that exits through a lead collimator defining the field. The cooling oil insulates the high voltage and carries heat to the housing, where the Tubehead Cooling Fan fan dissipates it between exposures, and the high-voltage feed reaches the head through the HV & Signal Cabling.

On the detector side, the scintillator converts X-rays to visible light, the CMOS array reads that light as a digital frame, and the readout board streams it to the console. In panoramic mode the C-arm rotates so the focal trough tracks the curve of the jaw, exposing each segment of the arch in turn as the detector reads continuously, then software stitches the strips into one image.