Theis a discussion page of me taking to myself! (not really, i just want to show my calculations so others can understand it)

Manufacture: Profit Chart

This is a work in progress: please change it if you find an error! EsTeR
ToDo:

find lowest sell price possible, new column, then re-calc the profit for each when prices are rock-bottom.

that should find some money losing items!

infill total capacity in one week.
infill a new column adjusted with overhead costs vs total one-week capacity

Timing

Time to build is always completed on the hour:

FIRST RULE

SK ^total ÷ BT ^single = QTY ^{first hour}

SK = engineer skill
BT = built time
QTY = whole number quantity

using an example TO PROVE WRAP AROUND ie: 100bt, 5 x 75sk, we could optimise production:

Hour 1: 375sk - 300bt = x3mod with 75skR

Hour 2: 375sk + 75skR = 450sk

450sk - 400bt = 50skR = x4mod with 50skR

Hour 3: 375sk + 50skR = 425sk

425sk - 400bt = 25skR = x4mod with 25skR

Hour 4: 375sk + 25skR = 400sk

400sk - 400bt = x4mod with 0skR

Soo, optimal time to build without wasting any engineer skill would be:
4 x hours at 15 x modules built!

Confirmed: SK wraps to next hour, which determines the optimal time period.

but

in-game testing is never SK>BT:

BT / SK = Hrs
Hrs / 24 = Days
(remainder) x24 = hrs
hrs is rounded up to next whole number.
eg:
110,000bt / 500sk = 220Hrs
220 / 24 = 9.16r days
0.16r x 24 = 3.9999984 which rounded up = 4hrs
220hrs = 9days & 4hrs using 500sk.
but using 499sk
gives 9.1850366 days, or
9days + 4.4408784hrs, which is
= 9days, 5hrs using 499sk. but using 495sk give 9days,7hrs but using 491sk give 9days,9hrs but using 488sk give 9days,10hrs ... for low bt items, the ratio swings wildly for a single item, but make 50 of them and the advantage of using ENG maximum is obvious.

OCD /off EsTeR (talk)

Overheads

or, Costs Of Upkeep
Engineers receive a salary at the end of the week and with maintenance costs of facilities (living and labs), will reduce your end-of-week profits by a certain percentage. Once a project's profit is calculated over a full one week run without interuption, then matched with the type of facility, profit margins will be more accurate.

Offset The Total Cost

Some items, irrelevant of build quantity over a complete week-time manufacturing run, may not actually be profitable enough to produce liquid funds! As with any minor profitable items, it will help reduce the weekly costs of your engineering personel and lab/living mantainance costs.

Flooding The Market

Every item is (usually) profitable to manufacture, but your sell price is determined by market forces. If you sell so much (ie: flooding) that you drive the price down in the proceeding weeks, you will have to re-evalueuate each manufacturing run using this new sell price of the new week, to find the best profits. ...have fun!
Items have differing amounts in the Market Capacity column which is a rough indicator of how many you can sell before you influence the Sell Price.

eg: selling x25 Dimension Missiles may slightly reduce the new-week sell price, but selling x25 Disruptor Guns will be classed as 'flooding' and will drive the sell price down, faster with each 'flood', every new week.

Note: 'Flooding' is excessive selling of a product, typically more than {2 x market capacity} per week, causing a sell-price drop every week until the lowest selling price is reached.

Note: There is a lowest-sell-price limit. (but i don't know what is it, EsTeR)

Profit Per Build Time

The only important thing!
The higher the decimal number, the better the profit. The best item may not be researched yet! Find another suitable item from your current manufacturing list.

Note: Everything is profitable (no negative decimals) as default until you start flooding!

Chart Definitions

Manfacture: no know = no no
Build Cost: supposedly raw material costs.
Build Time: the universal-contructor-machine-thing needs time.
Facility: space needed to build it.
Quantity Per Day: how much is made in a full 24hrs.
Market Capacity: how much to sell before price gets affected every week.
Sell Price: what you get for each thing.
Raw Profits: sell one-something to get this many credit-dollars, without paying your way.
Profit Per Build Time: portion of a credit-dollar you get for each tick of the build clock.
Total Profit Per Week: total monies made when paying your way to financial freedom... or something.
I've got a headache.

Manufacture Item	Build Cost	Build Time	Facility	Quantity Per Day¹	Market Capacity	Sell Price	Raw Profit²	Profit Per Build Time³

Bio-Transport Moudle	700	4000	small	quantday	4	950	250	0.0625
Boomeroid	230	3000	small	quantday	15	840	610	0.2033↓
Vortex Mine	250	5000	small	quantday	25	1130	880	0.176
Disruptor Gun	600	7000	small	quantday	10	2100	1500	0.2143↓
Devastator Cannon	1200	12000	small	quantday	20	4500	3300	0.275
Dimension Missile Launcher	1200	5500	small	quantday	25	3100	1900	0.3455↓
Dimension Missile	400	4000	small	quantday	30	1300	900	0.225
Personal Disruptor Shield	2000	14000	small	quantday	30	5770	3770	0.2693↓
Personal Cloaking Field	3000	18000	small	quantday	30	8300	5300	0.2944↓
Personal Teleporter	6000	25000	small	quantday	40	18200	12200	0.488
Toxigun	1200	3000	small	quantday	8	2780	1580	0.5267↓
Toxigun A	200	800	small	quantday	16	500	300	0.375
Toxigun B	300	900	small	quantday	16	700	400	0.4444↓
Toxigun C	400	1000	small	quantday	16	900	500	0.5
AAG Heavy	280	1200	small	quantday	15	700	420	0.35
AAG Mini	360	1600	small	quantday	30	900	540	0.3375
AAG Grenade	250	1000	small	quantday	15	600	350	0.35
Disruptor Armor - Head	1500	3800	small	quantday	20	3480	1980	0.5211↓
Disruptor Armor - Chest	1500	3800	small	quantday	20	3480	1980	0.5211↓
Disruptor Armor - Arms	1200	3400	small	quantday	20	2830	1630	0.4794↓
Disruptor Armor - Leg	1200	3400	small	quantday	20	2830	1630	0.4794↓
Inversion Launcher	3000	8000	large	quantday	8	7000	4000	0.5
Inversion Missile	1500	4000	large	quantday	25	3500	2000	0.5
Stasis Launcher	2000	6000	large	quantday	10	4760	2760	0.46
Stasis Missile	1200	2000	large	quantday	20	2650	1450	0.725
Multibomb Launcher	4000	10000	large	quantday	14	9260	5260	0.526
Multibomb Missile	1800	5000	large	quantday	30	4230	2430	0.486
Light Disruptor Beam	2000	12000	large	quantday	5	5600	3600	0.3
Medium Disruptor Beam	4000	20000	large	quantday	10	10500	6500	0.325
Heavy Disruptor Beam	8000	35000	large	quantday	15	20500	12500	0.3571↓
Small Disruption Shield	5000	20000	large	quantday	10	12500	7500	0.375
Large Disruption Shield	8000	30000	large	quantday	15	19800	11800	0.3933↓
Cloaking Field	6000	35000	large	quantday	17	16450	10450	0.2986↓
Teleporter	11000	45000	large	quantday	20	27700	16700	0.3711↓
Advanced Control System	4000	15000	small	quantday	6	8000	4000	0.2667↓
Dimension Probe	6000	25000	large	quantday	2	10000	4000	0.16
Bio-Trans	12000	35000	large	quantday	2	34000	22000	0.6286↓
Explorer	22000	55000	large	quantday	2	44000	22000	0.4
Retaliator	35000	75000	large	quantday	2	70000	35000	0.4667↓
Annihilator	50000	100000	large	quantday	2	100000	50000	0.5

¹ when using all engineers with 100 skill. ie: the best possible scenario.
² not regarding time, salary, maintenance.
³ basic profit per time, higher is better.
↓ shortened to four decimal places.