Seventy-five healthy bovine incisors were divided into 5 groups (n = 15). The self-etching primer (Transbond Plus, 3M Unitek) was applied on the enamel actively and passive for 0 (control), 5 and 10 s, followed by air jet application and light cured for 10 s (600 mW/cm2). The metal brackets were bonded with adhesive (Transbond XT) and light cured for 20 s each proximal surface (mesial and distal). The shear bond strength was determined after water storage at 37 °C for 24 h. The specimens were tested using a universal testing machine (Instron 3342). Once debonded, each specimen was examined to identify the failure mode. The bond strength data were subjected to One-way Anova and Tukey tests (α = 0.05) and failure mode data were analyzed by Kruskal–Wallis test (α = 0.05).
No significant difference in bond strength was found between 5 groups. Increasing the application time and applying agitation of self-etching primers did not affect the shear bond strength (p = 0.487). There were no differences between failure mode values in all tested groups (p = 0.88) and score 1 was predominant.
The shear bond strength of the self-etching adhesive is not influenced by the application mode.