Bamboo cutting board engraving depth

Hello, I am wanting to engrave bamboo cutting boards, and really like the black ( full ) speed. I was wondering if there is any way that the engraving doesn’t go deep into the board? I would like this to be used and feel if there are grooves then anything o the board will get stuck and be difficult to clean. Thoughts on how to adjust the glowforge is appreciated!

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I would suggest taking a look at this thread
Help with Power/Speed on Bamboo Cutting Board?

Also the search function is your friend :wink:

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Welcome to the forum. First, if you want dark, you don’t want full speed. The faster the laser head moves, the less time it spends burning away your image. t Second, bamboo isn’t really a wood, it is a grass and it’s cellular makeup alternates between long strands of dense and soft fibers. This gives it the “perfect blend” to allow it to be strong yet flexible, however it also means that is difficult to get a consistent engrave. That’s not to say it is impossible but you will want to sacrifice some material to get a feel for how your particular machine engraves. You can buy squares of bamboo flooring samples from Lowe’s for a few cents apiece.
And yes it will leave voids where food can get trapped and feed a ravenous colony of bacteria and mold. Its best used for decoration and not for meal preparation.

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Welcome to the forum Melanie!
Bamboo doesn’t burn evenly, so you will need to darken the wood (I use a black sharpie)
before I varnish it

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Just to add to what was stated by Steve above, you should not use engraved bamboo or wood for food prep. They are for decorative purposes.

You might get away with using them for serving solid products like hard cheeses and crackers. If I was going that way, I would probably put down a heavy coat of polyurethane so that it could be washed and sanitized after use.

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Have you looked through the Your First Prints section on working with manual mode?

That entire First Prints section is fabulous - the instructions say to go through it, but a lot of folks miss it in their excitement :slight_smile:

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All I’m gonna say is every cutting board has 2 sides :stuck_out_tongue:

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Just wanted to add: another way I’ve seen people darken the engraved sections is with coffee grounds.

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