Printing these sheets

The short version

Download the file that matches your paper, open it, and print at 100% / Actual size rather than “Fit to page”. That is all.

Why there are two files

A4 is 210 × 297 mm. US Letter is 216 × 279 mm. They are different shapes — Letter is wider and shorter — which is why a sheet designed for one prints badly on the other. The usual result is that your printer silently shrinks the page to fit, everything gets slightly smaller, and the boxes you were going to write in become boxes you cannot write in.

Most free printables are laid out for one paper size only. We lay every sheet out inside an area that fits both — 182 × 251 mm — and then centre that area on whichever page you asked for. The consequence is that the A4 file and the Letter file are visually identical, both print at true size, and neither needs scaling.

Print settings that matter

• Scale: 100%, Actual size, or None. Not “Fit”, not “Shrink oversized pages”. This is the setting that matters most.
• Paper size: matched to the file you downloaded. If your printer is loaded with Letter, use the Letter file.
• Orientation: portrait, unless the sheet says otherwise.
• Margins: default. We have already allowed 14 mm all round, which clears the non-printable edge on essentially every consumer printer.

Printing in black and white

Every sheet is designed to work in pure greyscale. The green is used only for headings and reference codes, never to carry information, so nothing becomes ambiguous when it prints grey. There are no large blocks of solid colour anywhere, because printing twelve copies of something should not empty a cartridge.

The fillable versions

Every sheet also comes as a fillable PDF. These have real form fields — click a box and type. They work in Adobe Acrobat Reader, Apple Preview, most desktop browsers and most mobile PDF apps.

• Save your typed copy with “Save As”, so you keep a blank original.
• Typed text appears in a standard font rather than the sheet’s own. PDF form fields are restricted to a small set of built-in fonts; this is a limitation of the format, not an oversight.
• Some mobile apps flatten forms when they save. If you need to edit it again later, keep the original too.
• You can still print a fillable version blank if you prefer — the fields are invisible until you click them.

Paper and binding

Ordinary 80 gsm paper is fine for most sheets. Three situations are worth spending slightly more on:

• Anything that lives in a workshop or a garage — heavier paper survives oily hands. A punched pocket works even better.
• Anything that goes outside — a pool log, a boat sheet, a trailer check. Consider a wipe-clean pocket rather than laminating, so you can still write on it.
• Anything you will keep for years — a service history register outlives the appliance it describes.

If something prints wrong

Nine times out of ten it is the scale setting. If a sheet still comes out clipped after you have set it to 100%, your printer may have unusually large non-printable margins; try the other paper size, which shifts the layout slightly on the page. If that fails, tell us which sheet and which printer — that is a bug worth fixing.