⁉️ FAQ

Can I use touch for homing and bed mesh?

Yes for homing. CARTOGRAPHER_TOUCH_HOME homes Z by touching the nozzle to the bed. Put it in your PRINT_START after levelling and before BED_MESH_CALIBRATE, as shown in the PRINT_START template.

Bed meshes are scanned rather than touched because scanning is far faster, and once touch has set your Z reference the scanned mesh is accurate. See Touch for details.

Does Cartographer Touch use the ADXL sensor?

No, Survey Touch currently uses the LDC1612 sensor to calculate when the nozzle has come into contact with the bed.

Can I use cartographer without touch without changing firmware?

Yes. Touch and scan are both available in the same firmware and plugin. Homing with G28 uses scan; homing with CARTOGRAPHER_TOUCH_HOME uses touch. To use scan only, leave CARTOGRAPHER_TOUCH_HOME out of your PRINT_START and set your Z offset against the scan model as described in Z Offset. Scan calibration is required either way.

Older [scanner] plugin: change mode: touch to mode: scan under [scanner] and create a scan model by following the archived scan calibration guide.

Do I need to run the calibration while hot or cold?

It doesn’t matter! That’s the point of touch! Do what works best for you.

Does my nozzle need to be clean when doing a touch?

Yes it does, we recommend a silicone nozzle brush, which is now included with all cartographer purchases. However you can also adjust your retries, heat your nozzle to 150c in your print start and then do the touch. It should smoosh the filament off of the nozzle for you to get a successful touch. Nozzle brush is 100% better however.

My bed mesh is scanning in Y direction and not X, how do i fix it?

Set mesh_direction: x in the [cartographer scan] section of your printer.cfg (see the Configuration Reference).

Older [scanner] plugin: the key is mesh_main_direction: x under [scanner].

What do I need to add or change in my print start macro?

See the PRINT_START template. In short: make sure your nozzle is no hotter than 150 °C, run CARTOGRAPHER_TOUCH_HOME after QUAD_GANTRY_LEVEL or Z_TILT_ADJUST, and run BED_MESH_CALIBRATE after that.

Older [scanner] plugin: the macro is CARTOGRAPHER_TOUCH and it runs after BED_MESH_CALIBRATE; see the old Print Start Macro page.

Does touch work with glass or garolite beds?

It CAN SOMETIMES work depending on the thickness of your glass or garolite bed. However we can’t say for certain. If its less than 2mm thick theres a good chance however we accept no responsibility if it doesn’t work!

Is it guaranteed that this will work on my printer?

As with a lot of things in life, we can’t guarantee 100% compatibility, it should be compatible with most well built printers, there are obviously some exceptions, the biggest impacting factor is the quality of the Z axis motion. If there is any binding or lack of consistency, then you may find that you will not be able to use this feature. You can still use regular cartographer scan mode though!

Can Cartographer be used with RepRapFirmware in either USB or CAN mode?

RepRapFirmware (RRF) doesn’t currently support multiple MCUs, with the exception of via CAN-FD, which currently Cartographer does not support.

What temperature is Cartographer safe to?

The Coil is safe until 160c
The MCU is rated to 85c however we’ve seen successful use until 100c. We recommend trying to keep it around 85c or lower.

What does it mean when my coil is showing negative temperatures?

You’ve more than likely damaged your coil by knocking off one of the resistors. This wont affect functionality while using TOUCH. Contact us on discord to discuss.

Do I still need to do the paper test?

When doing the manual steps of calibration yes, this shouldn’t be often as you can re-calibrate faster if using touch. You should only paper test method if you’ve drastically changed something and you have no model to work from.

Cartographer has been working for weeks, suddenly it isn’t, what’s wrong?

This can be for a variety of reasons. Here’s a short list of possible things to check:

Is your toolhead completely rigid?
Checked toolhead for loose screws?
Checked toolhead for bad wiring?
Checked A/B or X/Y and Z belt tension?
Checked lead screws?
Is your nozzle clean?

If those things are checked, redo your calibration from the very start and if still having issues, consult us on Discord by making a help thread.

Does Cartographer work with embedded magnet beds?

No, the embedded magnets will cause issues with your mesh. Magnetic sheets are perfectly fine as they cover the entire surface evenly.

Does Cartographer support Delta Printers

Currently Cartographer does not support Delta printers, support will be added in future revisions of our firmware and code.

Klipper is telling me it’s dirty… should I re-install?

Dirty means that your Klipper directory is not clean i.e. has had changes to it compared to what is on the Github, this isn’t something to worry about, it is expected with how Klipper currently deals with plugins.

How do I know what model of Cartographer I have?

See Which version do I have?, which covers both the hardware version (V1 to V4) and the plugin generation.

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