Why is my copy machine printing off-set?

Question by : Why is my copy machine printing off-set?
Basically the copy machine at my work place just happened to end up being one of my responsibilities, great! (sarcasm). It copies and receives faxes fine for tray 2 (8.5″x11″) as well as the bypass tray (11″x17″). However tray two is yellow paper which we use for something else. Tray 1 which is used to receive our faxes and make copies (8.5″x11″) is printing out our faxes with the top left corner about 2 inches down and over to the right. So the left margin and top margin have about 2 inches or so of blank white space and the right side and bottom of our copies and faxes are cut off by about 2 inches as well. The settings on both Tray 1 and Tray 2 are exactly the same….I triple checked, even screwed up Tray 2’s settings and changed them back and it still works fine. Tray 1 however will not print out correctly not matter what setting it is set to (there are a lot of options in different menus and I have tried as many combinations as I can) This started when a co-worker was messing with it, and of course she has no clue what she changed. I restarted the machine, I read all 5 manuals front to back, I tried every setting I could find and have about 250 screwed up copies to prove it.

Ricoh Aficio 2018D…help!!!!
Don was correct about the guides in the physical tray. The paper in both trays were placed exactly the same however when tray 2 was put into tray 1’s slot everything print correctly. I changed tray 1 around and nothing really worked, paper jammed, I fit it in sideways in landscape position and now it prints everything to scale on landscape…better than nothing I guess. Thanks…! :X

Best answer:

Answer by Don
First, try to eliminate the paper tray itself. Swap tray 2 for tray 1. Pull the tray out and lift it up slightly while pulling. While the trays are out of the machine, look into the machine to see if there is any paper stuck back behind the trays.

Compare the side and rear paper guides of the trays. Do they line up the same when set to the same paper size? (Sometimes the gears of the side or rear guides can skip a tooth, and the machine will not sense the paper size correctly).

If you slide tray 2 into the tray 1 position, and your faxes come out correctly, there is something wrong with the tray 1 paper tray itself.

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