Fretting Corrosion and Trunnion Wear—Is it Also a Problem for Sleeved Ceramic Heads?

Some modular bearing systems with large diameter metal-on-metal articulation have exhibited higher than usual revisions due to corrosion and metal debris originating from modular metal connections. Large diameter ceramic-on-ceramic bearings exist, which use a titanium alloy adapter sleeve for fixing the ceramic ball head to the stem taper. This study addresses the issue of taper fretting and corrosion for large ceramic bearings with standard and a newly designed experimental setup. While large metal diameter heads have been shown to be a cause for failure of THA, our results demonstrate that large ceramic heads even with a metal adapter sleeve have no effect on corrosion of modular taper connections.