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Calibration - 3D printing

In fact, I have a 3D printer since 2013 ( an Ultimaker 1 ) so I print since this time and all the 3D printer of the lab are also ultimaker 1 printer. But since the last update of the firmware I’ve got some strange issue with the dimensions of my parts. So I decided to make a calibration file and try to solve this issue.

Machine presentation

The Ultimaker 1 is the first machine from ultimaker. It is a DIY machine you buy in kit and you have ta assemble yourself. It’s a very popular machine in the FabLab community and I have mine since 2013 …

Design a calibration part :

I designed my file with Fusion360 :

Here you can find the source file STL.

Fusion 360 have a great tool to export the .stl. You can choose the refinement of your model and directly send your file to your slicer.

Basic tool More options Preview Mesh

Parameters for the print

To do my tests, I will use the parameters below into Cura 3.2.1. I used black PLA in 2,85mm.

Menu Parameters Value
Quality Layer height 0.15 mm
Shell Wall thickness 0.8 mm
Top/Bottom thickness 0.8 mm
Infill Infill density 10%
Infill pattern Grid
Material Temperature 220°c
Diameter 2.8 mm
Flow 110%
Speed Print speed 50 mm/s
Infill speed 30 mm/s
Outer wall speed 30 mm/s
Inner wall speed 40 mm/s
Travel speed 100 mm/s
Build plate adhesion Type Brim
Brim width 8 mm
  • Clic on the Prepare button.
  • It took 2h of printing
  • I put it on a SD card

Prepare the printer

First, you will have to set the temperature of your printer to the fuse temperature of your filament. For me, it’s 220 °C.

Clean your plate Open the extruder Put the filament into the extruder
 
Extrude “by hand” the filament The fused filament should come from the noozle Home your machine
 

Printing my file :

Beginning of the brim First layer Second layer

Result :

Measure and corrections

After the print, I took some dimensions as you can see below, an I compared them with those of my plan.

Top view Square outer dimensions Outer dimensions

As you can see there are big offsets and I need to correct that. Below you can see a table with all the dimensions and the offsets :

Info Dimensions Measures
Outer part 60.0mm 59.15 mm
Outer square 20.0mm 19.8 mm
Outer diameter 20.0mm 19.8 mm
Inner square 20.0mm 19.6 mm
Inner diameter 20.0mm 19.6 mm
Height Part 10.0mm 10.05 mm
Height Part 20.0mm 20.05 mm

The offsets are very similar for the inner parts. The firmware of the Ultimaker 1 let you correct this offset by modifying directly into the menu the values steps/mm for each axis. The Z axis seems to be ok, but there is the same offset on the X and Y axis.

The value of X and Y are 078.74 steps/mm. So we will have to change it to correct it. I will use this fomula :

New Parameter = (Dimensions/Measures) * OldParameter
Info Dimensions Measures New Parameter
Outer part 60.0mm 59.15 mm 79,87 steps/mm
Outer square 20.0mm 19.8 mm 79,53 steps/mm
Outer diameter 20.0mm 19.8 mm 79,53 steps/mm
Inner square 20.0mm 19.6 mm 80,34 steps/mm
Inner diameter 20.0mm 19.6 mm 80,34 steps/mm

So I decided to test the parameter 79,87 steps/mm For a first try.

The menu Modification of the parameter

Results

First Layer ( seems to be better looking ) Second layer Measure OK

Conclusion

My Printer is now ready to print good parts. Let’s go to the 3D printing page for the following assignment.