Lowering manufacturing costs of composite parts is essential to their continued use on commercial aircraft. Because Quality Assurance (QA) can constitute up to 40% of the manufacturing expense [1], there is much to be gained by reducing inspection cost. A considerable amount of the QA cost can be attributed to end-item nondestructive evaluation. With the ongoing development of automated methods of composite fabrication, we have the opportunity to incorporate in-process monitoring into these systems as a means of minimizing the need for end-item inspection. One current focus within The Boeing Commercial Airplane Group (BCAG) is the use of automated fiber placement (AFP) for composite lamination. Concurrent with the development of the AFP manufacturing process has been the development of in-process inspection techniques for fiber placement. By identifying key process variables and monitoring those variables during fabrication, our goal is to produce high quality fiber placed parts while incurring lower overall inspection costs.