Pep Printing Error

[EL BECK9960]

New member here, but I've messed around with some pep crafting years ago. Never finished one though and I'm giving it actual try now. But I've got a problem right out of the gate and I can't figure it out. The first pep I want to do is a Combat Evolved Marine, but my printer will not print the model faces on the entire page. It just prints half or more and then it runs off the page.

Can somebody please help me here?

 

[PlanetAlexander]

Welcome to the 405th EL BECK9960 ! I'm not a Pep user, but are you able to provide screenshots of Pepakura to show what you are printing? Also what paper size are you printing on? These will help us to figure out what's going on.

 

[EL BECK9960]

Welcome to the 405th EL BECK9960 ! I'm not a Pep user, but are you able to provide screenshots of Pepakura to show what you are printing? Also what paper size are you printing on? These will help us to figure out what's going on.

After printing over 20+ pages trying to figure out what the problem is, i think it's the printer I'm using. Either the printer is busted(Brand New) or it can't handle 110lb cardstock which is why i bought it specifically. It's a HP OfficeJet Pro 8025e, incase anyone that regularly uses a printer for 8.5x11in 110lb cardstock can point me towards one that is guaranteed to work. Thank you for the welcome by the way.

 

[NEMES1S]

could be a number of problems from how the patterns are positioned in pep designer to a range of page layout/printer page layout settings. you must make sure both the print setting in pep designer and the printer are correct are your page sizes in pep designer set to print in letter and not a4

 

[PlanetAlexander]

Seconding the recommendation of double checking everything is set to print at the right size. My Windows 10 laptop loves to be cheeky by never saving my print settings, so every time I print I have to change paper thickness, page size, manual/tray input, etc.

 

[EL BECK9960]

could be a number of problems from how the patterns are positioned in pep designer to a range of page layout/printer page layout settings. you must make sure both the print setting in pep designer and the printer are correct are your page sizes in pep designer set to print in letter and not a4

Yeah I checked both and even tried both A4 and Letter. It doesn't even print the diagnostic page right either and its different everytime. I don't have any regular printing paper to test so I'll assume it can't handle cardstock. Which is what I bought it for.

 

[PlanetAlexander]

Yeah I checked both and even tried both A4 and Letter. It doesn't even print the diagnostic page right either and its different everytime. I don't have any regular printing paper to test so I'll assume it can't handle cardstock. Which is what I bought it for.

Do you have another printer you can test the file with on normal paper? If you are able to share the file with us, we may be able to diagnose the issue too.

 

[Angus314]

Sharing the file could absolutely aid in diagnosing the problem! sometimes files get misaligned in the final printing and it can just be a setting that didn't get clicked when exporting to your printer.

 

[NEMES1S]

Yeah I checked both and even tried both A4 and Letter. It doesn't even print the diagnostic page right either and its different everytime. I don't have any regular printing paper to test so I'll assume it can't handle cardstock. Which is what I bought it for.

does seem odd. when i was doing pep i was using 160gsm which is about 108lb which is no where near as thick as i've seen alot of people use, but i did have to put it through my printers manual feed tray and not the regular tray otherwise it would just jam every time.

have you checked the print margin settings that used to do me all the time, especially the upscale/ descale fit to page setting. this is a pretty noob but im going to go there anyway you def have all the patterns fitting within single print pages and not overlapping into other pages.

maybe your printer is somehow not calibrated properly

 

[FalseShepherd]

That's interesting. Can you look at a print preview before you send it off? That would tell u if its mechanical with the printer or something about the other program and how it's laying out the pieces. I feel like I had a similar problem with pepakura designer but have not had this issue since switching to armorsmith.

 

[EL BECK9960]

That's interesting. Can you look at a print preview before you send it off? That would tell u if its mechanical with the printer or something about the other program and how it's laying out the pieces. I feel like I had a similar problem with pepakura designer but have not had this issue since switching to armorsmith.

Yeah on the print preview it looks the way it should and its supposed to fit perfectly on the pages directly in the center. But when I print them off half of its off the pages.

 

[NEMES1S]

Yeah on the print preview it looks the way it should and its supposed to fit perfectly on the pages directly in the center. But when I print them off half of its off the pages.

just a thought on this, how much paper are you putting in the tray at once. i found that if i had only a few pages in the tray at one time the feeder would pick up multiple pages at the same time, slip inside the rollers and print across multiple pages as it was feeding through 2 pages at once

 

[EL BECK9960]

just a thought on this, how much paper are you putting in the tray at once. i found that if i had only a few pages in the tray at one time the feeder would pick up multiple pages at the same time, slip inside the rollers and print across multiple pages as it was feeding through 2 pages at once

I did it one at a time for the most of it.

 

[Coreforge]

I don't think the cardstock is the issue as it seems to print the parts it prints fine, and if it couldn't handle cardstock, it would probably complain about it. Also, if it doesn't even print the diagnostics page correctly, your paper settings are probably wrong. There should be 3 places to set them, on the printer itself, in the printer settings on your computer, and in the print dialog. In theory, the settings in the print dialog should overwrite the other ones, but we're talking about printers here. If all of those are set correctly and the printer still prints incorrectly even when printing directly from the printer, I'd say try factory resetting it and try again. If that doesn't work, I've got no idea.
I find it interesting though that HP says you need at least 2GB of free drive space for the printer. Drivers aren't that big.

 

[EL BECK9960]

I don't think the cardstock is the issue as it seems to print the parts it prints fine, and if it couldn't handle cardstock, it would probably complain about it. Also, if it doesn't even print the diagnostics page correctly, your paper settings are probably wrong. There should be 3 places to set them, on the printer itself, in the printer settings on your computer, and in the print dialog. In theory, the settings in the print dialog should overwrite the other ones, but we're talking about printers here. If all of those are set correctly and the printer still prints incorrectly even when printing directly from the printer, I'd say try factory resetting it and try again. If that doesn't work, I've got no idea.
I find it interesting though that HP says you need at least 2GB of free drive space for the printer. Drivers aren't that big.

So it turns out it was the cardstock that messing up the printing. Just got some standard printing paper and it works fine now. So I'll be switching over to using foam and AndrewDFT's Reach ODST as my first build as it seems to be the most reasonable for a beginner. Thanks to everyone for the advice.