I'm planning on making my own notebook paper using Microsoft Excel and some Printer Paper. What do you suggest i use for paper? I want a paper that makes writing super smooth and that ink dries really fast on.

HP Premium Laser 32#.
Cheap enough and available everywhere.
Make sure the lines print well on your printer if its not a laser. I'm printing the lines with a Epson ink jet and it works fine.

I'm also using downloaded PDF files (and just starting to design my own) rather than Excel. There is also a program called "gpaper".

--John

any other suggestions?

I'm personally partical to the Hammermil Color Copy Paper 32# 96 brightness level and holds up well to all inks but the truely saturated inks, (such as the Baystates.)

Rather than making your own notebook paper, why don't you just buy Rhodia with the three holes already punched. Would be much cheaper! Unless there is something specific you want printed on your notebook pager.

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I have read from many others that HP 32# is the best. Some make their own writing tablets out of it.

Maybe you could try the 28# HP, but I know that 20# paper is really sucky.

Royal Linen is nice, but it costs quite a bit more.

OCE TopColor, Clairefontaine DCP, both available in weights from 90 gsm (26lb) through 100 gsm (28lb) and 120 gsm (32lb) up to over 200 gsm.

Also, I make my ruled paper templates using OpenOffice. Here's one I prepared earlier, having saved it to PDF, because the FPN won't let me upload the original file. (BTW, it's for A4 paper. If you want the original file to change it to US Letter, PM me with your email address and I will send it to you.)
Click to view attachment

Which OpenOffice tools do you use to make it?

Drawing.

1) Create a new, blank page.

2) Draw a horizontal line across the page. Copy and paste it 7mm (or 6, 8, 9mm or whatever) down. Copy and paste both lines the same distance down. You should now have 4 lines, equally spaced. Copy and paste again. 8 lines. Continue until you have a full page. Decorate as you wish. I have a double first line and a margin line.

3) Print. When it complains about the margins, don't scale, trim to fit. You should have a nice blank margin around the page, and the lines should come out 7mm (or whatever you chose) apart.

Because I try out different papers, I also put a little tiny label at the bottom of the page saying what paper I am printing the lines onto.

That sounds easy. So OOo Draw has enough control over line thinkness/style/position to get exactly what you want? I'm just about to use Inkscape. Not to draw in directly, but to render SVG files.

--John

It worked for me. Look at the PDF file attached, above.

I learned enough SVG to design some ruled practice paper, and used Perl to generate the lines and calculate the positions based on configurable parameters.

It seems that Adobe PDF reader is having trouble with the dashed lines I wanted for the "x height" marker. Instead of 2mm grey and blank, it showed gray and BLACK! It cleared up when I zoomed so I figured it was a display thing. But it did the same thing on the print!

Looks like I just have to use ever lighter colors. So now I have to fiddle with getting it to look good printed. The right overly-light color will print as a dotted or faint line, and too much will just show a darker line. Some colors show blotchy. I also can't decide how visible to make the margins.

But my first sheet I used for practice is showing promise:
Click to view attachment
And the resulting PDF file is less than 2K.

--John

can someone post a picture to what the packaging of HP #32 paper looks like?

Ba Da Bing: