Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 July 2016
Much of the data published on the subject of cost prediction for aircraft has dealt with empirical methods of estimating the total engineering hours of design and development. Less seems to have been written by or for the practising estimator, concerned not only with the total estimate at the initial stages of the project but also with its continuous refinement to full go-ahead, on to certification and later still to variants. In this paper the authors describe some of the methods they use, the historical background against which the methods have evolved and discuss some of the problems which are met.