diff --git a/src/utilities/post_process.sh b/src/utilities/post_process.sh
index 36a4f93763a337104e53f53abad8a8ffd6367f59..537f43066dd5c5b7f0fe5ef8de7081a0afd25616 100755
--- a/src/utilities/post_process.sh
+++ b/src/utilities/post_process.sh
@@ -1,5 +1,19 @@
-#!/bin/tcsh
-foreach file (*.csv)
-  if (-f data_plot/$file:r.xml) prep_plot $file --plot=data_plot/$file:r.xml | gnuplot
-end
-gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=output.pdf *.ps
+#!/bin/bash
+
+# prepare plots from data
+for file in $(ls *.csv)
+do
+    echo $file 
+    if [ -f data_plot/$file:r.xml ]
+    then
+        echo preparing plot for: $file
+        prep_plot $file --plot=data_plot/$file:r.xml | gnuplot
+    fi
+done
+
+# convert ps to pdf
+for file in $(ls *.ps)
+do
+    gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=$file.pdf $file
+done
+# vim:ts=4:sw=4:expandtab
diff --git a/src/utilities/prep_plot.cpp b/src/utilities/prep_plot.cpp
index 9b25c7de04cccdfc923eb1f21eab32b92ddf4588..c49fbe9f7fb4f4d6720d3531c43e9af9d43015bf 100755
--- a/src/utilities/prep_plot.cpp
+++ b/src/utilities/prep_plot.cpp
@@ -198,10 +198,11 @@ int main(int argc, char **argv)
   
   cout << "set size 1.0,1.0" << endl;
   cout << "set origin 0.0,0.0" << endl;
-  cout << "set lmargin  6" << endl;
-  cout << "set rmargin  4" << endl;
-  cout << "set tmargin  1" << endl;
-  cout << "set bmargin  1" << endl;
+  // the default margins work better
+  //cout << "set lmargin  6" << endl;
+  //cout << "set rmargin  4" << endl;
+  //cout << "set tmargin  1" << endl;
+  //cout << "set bmargin  1" << endl;
   
   cout << "set datafile separator \",\"" << endl;
   cout << "set grid xtics ytics" << endl;