US Patent 7892480 Dental prosthesis method and alloys

Dental prostheses are fabricated as a metallic alloy body by a technique that produces scrap alloy. Suitable gold base alloys have only base metal alloying additions which are more readily oxidized than gold and when combined with the gold can be age hardened. Exemplary metals include titanium, zirconium, yttrium and chromium. Scrap from fabricating a dental prosthesis is melted in air so that the base metals are all oxidized and substantially pure gold is reclaimed for reuse in new alloys.