Previously we discussed how to level the two nozzles on your Replicator 2X. Leveling the nozzles gets your nozzles aligned on the Z axis, today we will discuss calibration of the nozzles, which is aligning them on the X and Y axis. This process is the same on both the Replicator Dual and 2X. You know your nozzle calibration is out if you print something with vertical layers that are designed to be perfectly aligned and they wind up offset from the previous layer either on the X or Y axis, or both.
Prior to calibrating the nozzles, we recommend you level the nozzles as this will make determining the proper calibration slightly easier as you will be looking at two comparably thick lines. The next step is to load filament into both nozzles and make sure your platform is level. Once that is done you will go to Utilities> Calibrate Nozzles and once you select that it will explain that it will print 2 sets of rows of plastic. You will be looking for which one in each set lines up best with the longest row being Row 1. If you find row 7 to be correct that means you are likely already properly calibrated. If you can’t fine one that is perfect, choose the closest and run it again. Each row away from line 7 adds/subtracts a small amount of offset from the printer’s settings. Once you re-run this enough and get the lines 7 and 7 both being correct you should be calibrated properly.
The set of lines that print on the left side of the platform are for the Y Axis Setting. The Set of lines on the right side of the printer are for the X Axis setting.
Although you may have a nice dual extrusion traffic cone file that originally came with the printer or was off Thingiverse, we highly recommend not using it to see if your alignment is correct. This file was at one point improperly aligned which means your printer may be fine but appear to not be aligned. If you want a good quick test for alignment we recommend quickly making a 20mm x 20mm x 5mm tall block and stacking 2 directly on each other using MakerBot Desktop. To take this one step further we take a 10x10mm block out of the middle to create a square ring that allows internal and external comparison of the offsets.
If you have flashed your printer with Sailfish, you will no longer have the built in nozzle calibration. As such you will have to generate a print that serves the same purpose and allows you to then enter the settings into the LCD panel on your printer. To access this print use a Sailfish version of ReplicatorG and go to File>Scripts>Calibration>Replicator 1,2,2X>Replicator 2X Nozzle Calibration. We keep this file handy so we can easily calibrate if we make a change to the printer by leaving it on an SD card we use for testing a printer.
For MakerBot’s version of these instructions you can look here.