Small MDE is bloating in size?

Hi, I have a database that was made in Access 2000. I wanted to make an MDE of it so I had to convert it to Access 2003 and then made the MDE which turned out around 876 kb. This MDE is then put on a network drive where multiple users access it at different times. This db is also updated from another db on the same network drive by each user before each use. The update consists of a delete and append query. The problem I am having is this db grows in size to around 4 mb and the users complain of corrupt reports and so on. I am wondering where to look for the problem to this. The db should not grow that big after updates, the data is not changed by very much to explain this growth. Also a compact and repair makes little difference, the db still hovers around the 4 mb level. Thanks for any help. jrtool