Many thanks. That took me to the right area. The eventual solution, under
Axis Optios seems to be to use "Automatically select based on data" and "Base
Unit-Fixed-months"
Thanks again
bowfin

"Andy Pope" wrote:

Hi,

Unexpected skinny columns is normally a sign that the x axis is using dates
and that you only have values for sporadic dates.
If so you can change the axis to be category rather than time series.

xl2003: Right click Chart Options Axes X axis Category
xl2007: Select X axis Right click Format axis Axis Options Text

Cheers
Andy

--

Andy Pope, Microsoft MVP - Excel
http://www.andypope.info
"bowfin" wrote in message
...
When I create a stacked column chart, the columns appear as thin coloured
lines. How do I make them into normal size coloured vertical bars, please