Here is something I get asked frequently, so lets talk about calibrations. A calibration is alignment to a known reference standard.  Now, the following statements are my opinions only. I have easily calibrated more IFR 1200 units than anyone else on earth. That being said, KG Electronics is not an NIST Traceable CAL LAB. KG Electronics is a shop/repair facility that can calibrate units to very close to factory specs. Now what does that mean? It means that We use the exact equipment that IFR used to calibrate these monitors many years ago. I know, because I was there when they were calibrated. We maintained a comfortable temperature in the facility. We had a calibration procedure that was written, rewritten and then rewritten again to get the unit calibrated, then put through an ATE test station that was automated and the calibration checked. Many times the unit was kicked back to the calibration tech for repairs, or minor tweaks to a calibration pot, to pass final testing. Now, I know of no one who could calibrate the unit using the calibration procedure that was written in the factory manual. The factory calibration manual draft copy was horrible. So, the IFR engineers gave training to us techs and we basically wrote our own procedure on STENO pads . The ATE station to check calibrations at the IFR facility was very good. It consisted of Many types of HP gear all on a GPIB bus and the operator would go through a program written in Quick basic to verify the measurements and tests. I know of a few of my customers that send the repaired unit from KG Electronics to a Government test facility and I have seen the printouts of the tests. Wow, I was impressed that a facility actually exists with an actual ATE printout.  I have also toured NIST traceable CAL LABS that are just complete garbage on the data. Sure , their equipment is traceable but no accountability on procedure. The data is manually entered and how can you disagree with that?   Now with that said, the customer needs to decide on attempting to calibrate their own unit , let me calibrate here at KG, or send it to a calibration facility with NIST Standards. Now if the customer has anything to do with getting sued , a legal calibration is probably needed. A NIST Traceable calibration is in my opinion, not a better calibration at all , but insurance against lawsuits. The slim chance it has any ATE type testing at the end of the calibration is highly unlikely. Yet, this type of calibration will hold up in the court of law. All I can say is , I have a lot of experience of me against the machine in calibrating an IFR 1200. I learned where the weaknesses of the 1200 are, where  pots need to be set to pass in all ranges etc…. the list goes on and on. Now, to get to the nitty gritty of this article. Getting a 1200 to very close factory specs is what my goal is at KG Electronics, and I feel im mighty good at it.  I might also add, KG Electronics standard calibration is $140 as opposed to about $500 for an NIST traceable calibration. You can decide on which approach is right for you.