Mick,


I am not an Excel wizard, however I experimented with the formulas for a
while, and came up with the following:

Suppose you put people's names in column A.
Suppose you put people's wights in column B.
Put the default weight 90 kg in e.g. cell B1.

In cell B2 write the formula: =IF(ISBLANK(A2);0;$B$1)
It should be read "if the cell in column A (in the same row) is blank,
return 0, else return the value in cell B1, i.e. 90 kg". Important: The
dollar signs means an absolute cell reference.

Next, duplicate the formula in cell B2 down, for the number of seats in the
helicopter. (You can do this by clicking cell B2 and dragging the black box
in the lower right corner.) Note that the relative cell reference (A2) will
be propagated in converted into A3, A4 etc.

Put a summation in e.g. cell B12 containing =SUM(B2:B11)
Note that if you want, you can enter more accurate weights per person, if
you know, or can guess, the person's weight, by just typing it over the
default weight formula!

If you want assistance using the formulas from Excel, click Insert... -
Function.
Your problem can probably be solved in a multitude of other ways too...


Good luck!
Göran Halfvarson, Sweden


| -----Original Message-----
| From: Mick Fitzpatrick
|
| I'm working on a basic spreadsheet that will be a flight
| manifest for a
| helicopter. It consists of a column of names and has various weight
| calculations in the other columns. This is so we can
| calculate the all up
| weight of the aircraft. To simplify it each passenger is
| given an average
| weight of 90kg.
|
| Therefore, what I would like to achieve is that when a name
| is entered is
| (for example) in cell A12, then in cell D12 would appear 90.
| If nothing is
| entered in cell A12 then nothing is appears in cell D12.

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