George Boiadjiev, Kamen Delchev, Tony Boiadjiev, Kazimir Zagurski,
Rumen Kastelov, Vladimir Vitkov
Analytical Mechanics Department
Faculty of Mathematics and Informatics
Sofia University
5, J. Boucher Blvd., 1164, Sofia, BULGARIA
Institute of Mechanics
Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
Acad. G. Bonchev St., Bl. 4, 1113, Sofia, BULGARIA
Institute of Information and Communication Technologies
Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
Acad. G. Bonchev St., Bl. 2, 1113, Sofia, BULGARIA
Institute of System Engineering and Robotics
Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
Acad. G. Bonchev St., Bl. 2, 1113, Sofia, BULGARIA
Orthopaedic Trauma Department
University Hospital for Emergency Medicine ``Pirogov''
3-rd Orthopaedic Trauma Clinic
21 Totleben Blvd., 1606, Sofia, BULGARIA

Abstract. Background. Many orthopaedic operations involve drilling before the insertion of screws into the bone. Usually drilling is executed manually, which brings problems. Bone overheating is the most important one. To avoid such problems and reduce the subjective factor, automatic drilling is recommended.

Methods. As lots of parameters influence to the drilling process, the methods are experimental. They concern the experimental identification of the drilling technical parameters including the bone resistant force and the drilling process temperature. The resistant force and temperature are measured and plotted.

Results. Specific drilling effects are revealed during the experiments. The temperature deviations are kept in the safe borders. The temperature reduction is achieved by controlled trust force during automatic bone drilling regime in comparison with hand-drilling one. Algorithms are created and their software realization is made. Curves of resistant force and temperature with respect of the time are presented. A proposed idea of ultrasonic vibration using for ultrasonically-assisted drilling of a cortical bone and applying a controlled trust force during automatic bone drilling regime is discussed.

Conclusions. Automatic bone drilling can solve the high-temperature problems which arise during manual drilling. An experimental setup is designed to identify some parameters of bone drilling such as the resistant force due to variable bone density, the appropriate mechanical torque of drilling, the linear speed of the drill, and the electromechanical characteristics of motors, drives and corresponding controllers. The automatic drilling guarantees higher safety for the patient.

Received: October 9, 2013

AMS Subject Classification: 92C50

Key Words and Phrases: automatic bone drilling, temperature minimization, experiments, orthopedic surgery

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