Panasonic KX-P1121 ejects pages...

Sounds like page length setting is incorrect. Instead of shortening the page length down to  the height of one label (which is probable an invalid page setting for that printer. Most dot matrix printers have an internal minimum page length of 3-4" as this is the smallest single piece of paper that they can feed. Setting page length below this limit is usually ignored.

Change your approach to have multiple labels per page and keep the page length up and it should work.

thanks. i tried setting the length to 4" then using
an A5 size paper too. but it still insists on ejecting
tonnes of labels.

do you suppose this printer is such that
it automatically form feeds once it completes printing ?

also, has the printer setting for tractor, manual feed etc..
has anything to do with this ?

Software might be issuing automatic FF at end of page, but printer should only advance amount specified by form length. Printer setting and software need to agree.

M

that's what i thought too. i used a diff dot matrix, and
this time, it ejected one label after printing, but stopped
accurately on the following.

as for this panasonic printer, i'm using manual feed, and not
tractor. could that be the reason ?

The manual feed is what's causing your problem.  The printer thinks it is printing on single sheets of paper that are 4" long, after printing on the paper it is trying to eject the page but it just feeds out labels searching for the EOP (End Of Page).  If you set it to Tractor it will know that it is using a continuous form and it will stop right where you want.

Next..

What type of labels are you using?  What brand (Avery?)
What are the measurements (Label W & H, Dist - between labels, dist - collumns if any)...
What application are you using to print the labels from?  If WordPerfect or Word you can simply select the Brand & Style # and it will automatically format your document to print correctly on those labels.

Hope this helps!

Joel R. Helgeson

Manual feed is the problem. It wants to feed until it finds OOP (Out Of Paper) sensor going true. Since you're feeding tractor feed labels it searches until it figures its WAYYYYYY past one sheet and gives up assuming sensor failure.

Precisely!

Mark, You know quite a bit about printer troubleshooting, what's your background?

Joel R. Helgeson

thanks for your input guys. i tried using tractor instead.
still it ejects, but fewer labels this time.
(sorry Joel, had to reject ur answer this time around)

i'm not using any branded labels and the software portion
is written by me in SQL Windows. what it does is just grab
the default windows printer(and all the settings) then does something like a print screen (on a properly sized form) to the printer.

since i tried it on 2 diff printers and got 2 diff results
(first one ejects only 1 label, the other about 10!), i suspect that it could be some problem with the sensor of the 2nd printer? but how do i test that to be sure ??

To jrhelgeson:

I have an Epson shield. This meant I drove up to Atlanta and spent a week in training on dot matrix printers. I also am a hp LaserJet registered developer.

M

Good answer, (Better than mine!)

Joel

thanks Mark, i will try it out.

i did do one more thing to the printer. just press the FF button and it kept on feeding loads of labels. i tried peeling off one label in between a few (so as to trick the sensor) but it kept on feeding anyway. do you suppose the sensor is kaput as well ?