Need some clues -- sending plots out to an Oce repro shop

[Wes Macaulay]

Some of you might remember the help sheet I wrote for creating plots to be processed by Oce Reprodesk. Well, it sucks.

Revit's lineweights when you're plotting in house come out fine. But using the Windows plotter driver (not the HP one - that one drops bits of the plot when you send it to Oce plotters) for the DesignJet 750C (which is what the repro shops recommend around here) creates plot files that are too light when they print on the Oce printers at the print shops. Per another recent post, I don't want to have to adjust my lineweights if they work fine in-house. It's only when I'm sending my plots to the out-house (ha ha) that there's a problem.

What are the rest of ya Revit users doing about sending plots out for reproduction with Oce-powered print shops?

Thanks in advance.

[beegee]

I just send them pdfs, ... works fine.

[Tom Dorner]

I thought Oce and Autodesk had worked out a deal with the DWF format to be used by Oce. I saw a press release on this a few months back, so it may be worth checking into.

[BomberAIA]

I use PDF's only. Lineweights turn out perfect.

[SkiSouth]

Posted this earlier...( Sorry my ignorance doesn't help me in linking to previous posts....)

The repro house we use has OCE equipment (9800)to plot to. The driver I found that works best with them is the OCE 9400 version 2.8.2(NOT the 9800) . Set your plot size up as default, (mine's 24x36, 300 DPI, Portrait) DO NOT USE a Remote Control Header. Under Finishing select Printer Default.

All pen weights reflect the preview image Revit Shows

[sbrown]

The problem is not your plot files its the oce 9800, it doesn't use as much toner. If you take the same plt file and print to a 9600, it comes out great. on the 9800 you will loose lines. I just spoke with our shop and the oce tech can increase the amount of toner, however your shop won't want to do this because for 90% of there other customers they will be using more toner than necessary. The fix we used at VFA was to increase all our lineweights and print exclusively to the 9800. If it still drops data the oce tech needs to bump up the toner a bit.

[PeterJ]

I plot to a plt file using the 750C driver, email it to the bureau and they run it out using reprodesk and we get perfect copies back each time, just using the out of the box lineweights. I would use Apprentice or the reprodesk client but Apprentice on my machine got bust and I never got around to fixing it and the current favourite bureau don't use the reprodesk client tool because they centralise everything and then send it out to gegraphically appropriate printers.

[Wes Macaulay]

I'm getting a test print done of DWFs printed from Revit, printed in Oce Publishing Tools at the print shop.

Stay tuned. If this keeps up, I'm going to be a DWF evangelist... it plots! It redmarks! It's lighter than...

[affdesco]

The local top repro firm Brownies states, "we have to convert .PLT and DWG type files with software and that takes time and can have problems." There is also a cost for such effort, often which is passed on to You, Ask Them, your repro staff, and they will say they can do anything, so ask what is easiest for them and cost effective. Minimize any file translations and you minimize possible errors. Good Luck.