width of spreadsheet no consistent

[kop442000]

On one sheet I have 10 columns A to J, with each being 5.00 in width.

On the next sheet, I have 20 columns (A to T), with each being 2.50 in width.

10 x 5.00 = 20 x 2.50 and yet when I switch between the two sheets they occupy different widths on my screen (same zoom level). Even when I try to print, they cover a different width on the print preview.

How can this be?

The reason I'm doing this is because I have two different spreadsheets with a logo on etc., and I want the logo to be the same size and fill same region on each print out. I thought I could start to ensure this by having total width and height of rows and columns to add to the same on each sheet but this doesn't seem to work for the reason above.

 

[oldbrewer]

use pixels to set column widths - works for me

 

[JoeMo]

When you set column width using Home>Cells>Format>Column Width Excel assumes your input is in Characters and adjusts your input to produce an integer value in pixels (pixels must be whole units). Characters = (pixels - 5)/7. A character width of 5.00 is exactly 40 pixels, but a character width of 2.5 would produce 22.5 pixels so Excel adjusts the 2.5 characters input to 2.57 characters which equates to 23 pixels. So, you get 20 x 2.57 = 51.4 rather than 50.0.

 

[kop442000]

Thanks for the replies.

So is there a way I can set exactly how many pixels each column is?

I'm using the mac2011 version. It shows me characters (and cms) but I want to use pixels to avoid the above.

 

[JoeMo]

Sorry, I don't use a Mac.

 

[oldbrewer]

if you put eg aaaaaaaaaa in every cell in row 1 and adjust the width (removing or adding a's) until the cell is just full then the smaller required width will have half the number of a's then note the settings