Print outs front & back don't match

[3howards]

I'm having some issues with our color printer here at work. It doesn't duplex and I'm running heavy stock through the bypass tray. My problem is that the crops don't match front & back. It's about 1/4" off. Any ideas on how I can get this to work.

I'm running 4.25"x6" (finished) postcards with bleeds, 4-up on 11x17. One of the designers that's figured this out is in a meeting and the folks that need this have a meeting with a client shortly.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Virgo Nightingale]

When you go to print, make sure the page is positioned at the left edge - the other positions take printer margins into consideration which can make things shift. Otherwise try to shift that second page over so it will line up. That's what I'd try to do, at least at first.

[rickself]

I'd have it center the imag both sides. If you align to the left edge, when you turn the sheet over, it won't back up... if I'm reading you correct.

[Jackimalyn]

I had this problem a lot when woring at my last job- lots of digital printing. Heres one of the reasons offset is nice, there's a person to line it up.

What we always ended up doing was printing and then tweeking until we got it perfent. The margins looked crazy onscreen but printed well. As soon as you find out how much your printer is off, it should be the same always.

If its really far off, (and you lease or have the $$) you can have it fixed so it isnt as bad. We had our xerox rep come in like every other month to re-align it so it duplexed better, but if you're using a small printer ay home, I guess its not worth all that trouble. Good luck-

[steve2112]

I have been using copier for the last three years. It never lines up correctly. You have to print all of one side then put the other side through and adjust in the layout program accordingly

steve

["Technical" Terry]

I have been using copier for the last three years. It never lines up correctly. You have to print all of one side then put the other side through and adjust in the layout program accordingly

steve

I agree with steve. When going to a copier (even our Xerox DocuColor 240) you just have to manually adjust. The offset isn't quite as bad when duplexing in the machine, but still needs adjusting from time to time.

[budafist]

Yup that's what I would do too - print all of one side first (with plenty of overs) and the print out the second one with plenty of test runs (adjusting to fit).

[PrintDriver]

You have to shift the piece being printed on the back.

If you align to one side for the face
You have to align to the other side for the back.

Nothing will help if the image area and crops aren't placed in the exact same place in relation to the doc setup.

[budafist]

I see the people in our copy centre do this - not sure if it's common across the board in printing.

When you are printing your second side, make a knife cut through the crop marks on the first (front) side. Turn your sheet around. Compare the cuts to the crop marks on the second (back) side. Now you can see how many mm you have move your design left, right, up or down.

[mungo]

I see the people in our copy centre do this - not sure if it's common across the board in printing.

When you are printing your second side, make a knife cut through the crop marks on the first (front) side. Turn your sheet around. Compare the cuts to the crop marks on the second (back) side. Now you can see how many mm you have move your design left, right, up or down.

What I usually do is hold the sheet up to a bright light so as you can see through the paper and see haow far off the backup is.

[budafist]

Works with paper, not so good with card. Same idea though :)