Printing two A5 documents on A4 sheet

Topic

New Reply

I’m using an HP895Cxi printer with Windows Vista. Using Word 2007, I’ve done a portrait format document with centred text which I want to print (scaled down to A5 size in duplicate side-by-side) on an A4 sheet in landscape mode; the sheet will then be photocopied and each copy divided down the middle to produce two A5 ‘flyers’ in portrait format.

I can almost do what I want. I can get the document to print in duplicate side-by-side on the A4 sheet, and the resulting left-hand A5 is fine, with centred text and equal margins at either side. But in the right-hand A5. while the layout of the text remains the same as in its pair, its the side margins are not equal, being narrower on the left and wider on the right, resulting in that A5 looking out of kilter.

Can anyone help? I’d be very grateful for suggestions.

Reply | Quote

Replies

Cross-posted at: http://www.msofficeforums.com/word/15445-printing-two-a5-documents-a4-sheet.html
For cross-posting etiquette, please read: http://www.excelguru.ca/content.php?184

Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Reply | Quote

My guess is your printer driver doesn’t let you print as close to the bottom margin as it does to the top. Whatever you are doing to duplicate the page is probably using the printable area to squeeze the pages into rather than exactly the A4.

Can you tell us how you “get the document to print in duplicate side-by-side”? We need to understand what method you are using in order to work out why it isn’t working correctly.

As an alternative, since you are photocopying, what size is the glass on the photocopier? If it is A3 then you can simply print 2 A4s and let the photocopier scale it to 71% onto A4. This avoids the need to work out a software solution.

Reply | Quote

Thanks for your reply Andrew (and apologies for the cross-posting; Paul has made me realise the error of my ways!)

What I’ve done to so far is:

– compile the document as a portrait format A4

– highlight the text with Cntrl-5

– copy with Cntrl-C

– at the bottom of the text use the Down arrow key to open a new blank document beneath the one just compiled

– Cntrl-V to place the text into that blank document

This has given me two identical copies of the document I want, one above the other.

– Click the print button and in the Zoom section of the Print window, alter the value of ‘pages per sheet’ to 2

– Print

This gives me a single A4 sheet, landscape format, with the text laid out in two vertical A5 panels; just what I want, except that the A5 on the left-hand section of the sheet is perfectly centred in its half of the page, while the A5 on the right-hand is not perfectly centred – on the longest line of text, the left margin (i.e. the one nearer to the centre of the sheet) is about 7 mm, while the right margin is about 21 mm.

I had thought about using the photocopier to reduce two A4 copies to make one master for ongoing photocopying, but it’s difficult to avoid getting a mark at the junction of the two originals, which almost inevitably shows up on the final flyer if the cutting isn’t spot on.

Reply | Quote

Hi LittleValley,

What you’re doing isn’t actually creating a new document – it’s simply adding a new page to the existing document.

That said, your problem description suggests you may have different left/right margings and/or a gutter margin. Using equal left/right margins with no gutter should resolve that.

Alternatively, what you could try (with equal left/right margins and no gutter) is:
• Change the document format to A3 landscape.
• Apply a two-column layout.
• Ensure the inter-column space is twice your side margin width.
• If necessary, insert a column break at the end of the first column
• Ensure the content in both columns align vertically
• Print the document using the ‘scale to size’ function, to scale the output to A4.

Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Reply | Quote