ChiefHarrell Posted July 11, 2020 Share Posted July 11, 2020 I've had CA 9.0 for years and have used it generally only for drawing floor plans and have always simply printed them on standard 8.5 x 11 paper. But, I'd like to send my floor plans to Office Depot for printing on large format and to scale but am told the layout is not set up for the large format printer. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joey_martin Posted July 11, 2020 Share Posted July 11, 2020 I started with v9.5 and have sent plans to Staple since then, never a problem. Make sure your PDF is 24"x36" paper (or whatever you are using) and to scale. Tell the print shop to NOT scale the page "to fit" it is already properly sized. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChiefHarrell Posted July 11, 2020 Author Share Posted July 11, 2020 So did you have to install the print drivers of the large format printer being used by Staples or just simply change the paper size on your layout? I've changed paper size to 24' x 36" and kept scale at 1/4". Office Depot can't accept the layout in the format I'm attempting to send it in so I saved the layout as a jpg file and that still doesn't work. Is there an online chat with CA which might be helpful? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joey_martin Posted July 11, 2020 Share Posted July 11, 2020 You need to "print" to PDF and email the PDF to them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneDavis Posted July 11, 2020 Share Posted July 11, 2020 Describe your at-home printing method, in detail. The one you use to put ink on letter-sized paper on your home printer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChiefHarrell Posted July 11, 2020 Author Share Posted July 11, 2020 It's just a small HP 8720 printer. I typically send my floor plans via pdf to a draftsman I use who then prepares the plan on AutoCad and then prints the plans. I'm just trying to avoid all this. I'm not technologically savvy. I'm sure this is a simple task for anyone more knowledgeable than me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DzinEye Posted July 11, 2020 Share Posted July 11, 2020 @ChiefHarrellDo you usually print from a Layout or from a plan file ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HumbleChief Posted July 11, 2020 Share Posted July 11, 2020 What version are you using? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChiefHarrell Posted July 12, 2020 Author Share Posted July 12, 2020 Print from the plan file. Using 9.0 version Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneDavis Posted July 12, 2020 Share Posted July 12, 2020 Your 9.0 is pretty old, and most of us cannot remember how it works. Looking at the feature list dated 2003, it had improvements in Layout. That is where you should be sending your views, and from which you should be printing to pages in .pdf format. Why don't you try going to the Chief website and watching some training videos about Layout. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kbird1 Posted July 12, 2020 Share Posted July 12, 2020 19 hours ago, ChiefHarrell said: It's just a small HP 8720 printer. I typically send my floor plans via pdf to a draftsman I use who then prepares the plan on AutoCad and then prints the plans. I'm just trying to avoid all this. I'm not technologically savvy. I'm sure this is a simple task for anyone more knowledgeable than me. I not sure sending it to Staples should be anything different that sending it to your Draughtsman if both are sent in PDF format , but if you are printing from Plan only you will not have a Titlebar etc , that is where the Layout file comes in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneDavis Posted July 12, 2020 Share Posted July 12, 2020 19 hours ago, ChiefHarrell said: It's just a small HP 8720 printer. I typically send my floor plans via pdf to a draftsman I use who then prepares the plan on AutoCad and then prints the plans. I'm just trying to avoid all this. I'm not technologically savvy. I'm sure this is a simple task for anyone more knowledgeable than me. I gotta ask. Why aren't you realizing more income for yourself by preparing the construction docs using Chief 9, which is maybe even more current that the ACAD the draftsman is using. Chief 9 has all the horsepower needed to produce first-class con docs. Why the draftsman? Why not just you? Drawing things twice makes too much room for error. You'll need to learn annotation skills, which include dimensioning, notes and callouts, schedules, and more, but it is all there in Chief for you. And you will need to learn to use layout. Don't ever think you are too old to learn this. Many of us were likely ten years older than you are right now when we first began with Chief. The video tutorials make it all so easy today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChiefHarrell Posted July 12, 2020 Author Share Posted July 12, 2020 Gene - thanks for the comments. No doubt, you are absolutely correct. I've just not had the time (or made the time is probably a better use of words) to learn the software. I managed to do floor plans with basically no instruction and just never went any farther than that. Thanks for the incentive for me to watch the tutorials and do all this myself. Draftsman is not always able to see my vision so it only makes sense that the one with the vision prepare the plans. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DzinEye Posted July 12, 2020 Share Posted July 12, 2020 @ChiefHarrell I hope you find some good inspiration from Gene there, but if in the mean-time you just want to print per your usual way and move on for now, here's what the Print dialogue box looks like in the current X12 version of Chief... I have no idea what it looked like in Version 9, but you may be able to garner enough info from this screenshot to get it to print to scale from your plan view. If your dialogue box looks nothing like this and you don't have the option to change the scale and paper size per the screenshot below, you will either need to set up a layout per the comments above. ( Ideally you should anyway)... or if worse comes to worse you can print your normal way you usually do on 8.5 x 11 paper but add a long line just below the floor plan that is a nice even length, let's say 40' long. Then, if you want the plan printed at 1/4" = 1'-0" scale tell the print shop to print your PDF on 24"x36" paper so that the line measures 10" long when printed. They should be able to do the calculation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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