Printing multiple copies of multiple page documents double-sided on a printer that can only print on one side of paper at a time requires printing the same sheet of paper twice.
So how does one do it as simply as possible? Without having to manually reorder printed pages or press print multiple times or accidentally miss pages or collate pages in your copies in the wrong order!
Let’s start with the simpler case of a document with an even number of pages, for example, a six-page document that is desired to be printed double-sided on three sheets of paper.
(1) In the print dialogue, tick odd pages only. In the Adobe Acrobat print dialogue there is an option to print just the odd (or just the even) pages but if you are missing this option you can manually enter the pages to print as 1, 3, 5, etc. Enter the number of copies of the document you want e.g. 3. Typically, the collate option will be automatically checked – this is what you want and just means that the pages will be printed as normal in order, rather than 3 copies of page 1 followed by 3 copies of page 2, etc. Ensure that the ‘Reverse order’ checkbox is not ticked; sometimes it is ticked by default in which case untick it.
(2) Print your document with these options and you will get e.g. 3 copies of your document but with just the odd pages printed. So, for our six-page document example, we will have 9 sheets of paper printed on one side with pages 1,3,5,1,3,5,1,3,5 printed in that order – so in the output tray, from top to bottom, the page order is 5,3,1,5,3,1,5,3,1 (each upside down).
(3) Put the pages you just printed from the output tray back into the paper source tray with the blank side facing up* and the top of the page innermost (so the last page of the ream just printed is the first page fed).
(4) In the print dialogue, select both the even pages checkbox and the ‘Reverse order‘ checkbox. Again, Adobe Acrobat has option checkboxes to achieve this but if you are missing these options you can manually enter the pages to print as e.g. 6, 4, 2. Enter the number of copies of the document you want as before e.g. 3. Again, typically, the collate option will be automatically checked which is what you want.
(5) Print your document with these options and that’s it! You will get, say, 3 copies of your document printed double-sided with each copy’s pages in the correct order in your output tray.
If you have an odd number of pages in your document then:
1) before step (3) above, remove the very last sheet of paper from each of the copies in your stack of copies. So, for example, if you are making 3 copies of a 5-page document, you will have 9 sheets after step (2) with page numbers: 1,3,5,1,3,5,1,3,5. In this case, remove all the last sheets of paper from each copy so you have just page numbers: 1,3,1,3,1,3.
2) after step (5) above, add back in the sheet you took away to each copy, so in the previous example you will have 9 sheets of paper: pages 1/2 on the first sheet, pages 3/4 on the second sheet, page 5 on the third sheet, page 1/2 on the fourth sheet and so on up to page 5 on the ninth sheet.
*It is worth performing a test of the whole process with just a single copy of your document to make sure you know how to feed the sheets of paper into your printer in the correct orientation, so you don’t print on the same side of paper twice. If your printer behaves differently to mine (Samsung ML-1665), where the top side of the topmost sheet in the bottom paper feed tray is printed on (innermost becomes top of page) and this ends up face down in the top output tray (so the last page printed is topmost in the output tray; top of page is outermost), you may have to revise the process slightly but the basic principle should still apply.
Hope this helps!
