Unseen Crew - Medium and Large ships must surely have crew we don't see in-game for practical reason.

[Hamm172]

The title says it all. I can see why an Eagle or Sidewinder would be single crew, but the other ships are too damned big. The workstations are present and obvious on many of the ships and the multicrew system in game seems to confirm this. I've tried several different ways to search for this bit of lore here to confirm it but had little luck.
Surely this question has been asked before?

Has there been direction from Frontier or has anyone worked out how many crew might man an Imperial Cutter, Corvette, or Asp X? I'm asking for immersion and logbook entry reasons.

 

[wetwire]

I see ships in elite as being similar to modern-day airplanes in that they typically have 1 pilot and maybe 1 co-pilot. While most of the operations are automated in such a way that one person could fly a very large ship alone, it does not exclude the assumption that a large vessel could benefit from more crew.

On most ships there are visible extra seats for NPC crew, or Multicrew which implies the ship will function "better" with more crew.
An example would be when a player is manning the turret of a ship it is more accurate then the native auto tracking without a player controlling it.

In the Dark Wheel by Robert Holdstock
The story implies that our ships have more then just a pilots chair, and that there are various consoles on the bridge that could be manned. ie Astrogation console, or Trader's ManOP console.

"Watching the lush world from his seat at the astrogation console, Alex Ryder expressed an audible sigh of regret that he had not been allowed down to the world itself. Next to him, fingers moving expertly over the keys of the trader's ManOp console, his father grinned."

Regarding the Cutter, Corvette and Asp X, the wiki describes how many 'pilots' seat it has, which I would take as the minimum required for 'optimal' performance, or possibly how many bridge crew. This does not preclude other crew such as maintenance, engineers, medical, or deck hands that keep our larger ships running smoothly. Immersion and flavor would almost demand more then just a pilot, but if you're looking for lore validation then I think this should be adequate to assume every ships has a crew of some kind biased on available 'pilots' chairs.
Cutter - 3-4
Corvette - 3-4
Asp X - 2

 

[Hooplah]

The Panther Clipper in Frontier: Elite II had a crew of 12. The player had to hire them and pay them! With the EDO fleet carriers we can now walk around and see some of the crew.

 

[Hamm172]

Both answers very helpful. Thanks!!