Hi. Can sterling silver be etched or engraved on the Aura? I am very new to laser cutting and am eager to try new ideas on various materials. have heard Laserbond 100 used for certain metals but that stuff is expensive and I’d love to know if it would even work with an Aura. I have a bunch of old sterling silver spoons I’d love to try etching. Since they’re not flat I don’t know if it would work regardless of what I treated it with. Thank you!
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One thing to keep in mind is that Laserbond allows you to permanently mark on metals rather than etch or engrave. I don’t have an Aura, but the Performance series cannot engrave any metals, and etching is limited to anodized or painted metals only.
A cheap alternative to Laserbond is automotive brake cleaner moly-lube spray (!) – try searching for it and you’ll see a number of example from a few years ago. Caveat: I have no idea if it will work with the Aura, so testing will be critical to success.
Oh, about the curvature – the deeper the curve, the narrower the focused area will be, so further away from the focus zone will be distorted more.
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Great advice from @dwardio.
For a thorough dive into some ways you can work with metal and the glowforge, check out #11 here:
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Of note: most silverware one woulld run across is a thin layer of silver over another material and on older pieces you might even see it showing through.
Thank you. I’ll check if that’s the case. I will likely try the brake cleaner suggestion. Mostly I’m just eager to try materials I can safely experiment with! The Beyond the Manual section is helpful but I asked because I couldn’t find much info about sterling silver.
Whoops! I had a serious brain cramp when I mentioned brake cleaner. 
I meant to say moly-lube spray (available at most automotive parts stores). Sorry!
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There has been a lot of talk lately about TiO which is an ingredient in most but not all white paint which leaves a black surface bonded to most metals. I am looking for the TiO powder than I can control the concentration which is quite variable in white paints.
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