Thanks for the heads up about the limpets.
I loaded up and went out to learn a bit about mining, using the mining guide.
Made a little under 200,000 Cr on my first haul, with a Type 6 rigged with some odd bits that I had left over from my first attempt at building a Cobra III mining ship and whatever my station had available.
Lessons:
I got a little fast and looped the planet, coming down into the ring on the sunset side of the ring - but I was so focused on mining I didn't realize it until after I had finished mining my first rock and it was pitch black.
I don't know if it was because I started mining on the dark side, but pirates never came by for a visit -
has anyone mined the dark side and had pirates drop in? It would be interesting to find out if pirates tend to avoid jumping in on mining that is going on in the dark.
First I was a little worried about being on the dark side, but I soon figured out that if I held to the surface of the ring, and kept heading towards a lighter part of the sky I solved a few problems at the same time:
- I could see silhouettes of the rocks against the lighter parts of the sky.
- By continuously heading towards those silhouettes, against the lighter part of the sky, I also didn't double back on myself.
- With extra use of prospector limpets I would fire one towards towards a more distant silhouette and as soon as I could lock on to one I would engage my thrusters and follow it to a rock - it would typically get 1.5-3 km in front of me before attaching to a rock, and then I would have a course distance reading, and an idea what kind of spin the rock has. Once I was within 1km I would activate my mining lasers and slow down a little, as soon as my mining lasers would lock on, I would do a hard break and come to a stop. I would then observe for a bit to see if my mining lasers would stay locked on for the majority of the time if so I would start mining, if not I would edge a little closer.
- Helped to have a Prospector Limpet Controller that could handle 2 limpets ( I know it would normally cost more, but it's all that was available, and really came in handy to keep track of my route and occasionally use 2 prospecting limpets on the same rock to get a better idea of it's spin in the dark relative to my ship ).
Originally I looked to try mining in a pristine ring listed in ED Utilities, but according to my galaxy map, there wasn't even a planet in that system and when I took my Cobra III to check it out, all I found was a star and otherwise empty space, so I just hung around my home system. Still, for what was supposedly a so-so ring I don't think I did to bad on my first try.
I planned ahead for pirates, and as soon as I got within visual distance of rocks, I plotted a hyper route to my systems nearest neighboring star and booked marked it, with the idea to hyper to it and then immediately double back to my home system. When I finished with mining I realized I really didn't want to plod some 7000 LS to the nearest station, so I used my escape plan, jumping to my neighboring star and then as soon as I cooled enough (~20 seconds) back to my home system, which left me only about ~700 LS ( some 2-3 minutes ) from my home station.
Questions:
If I find a particularly reliable spot, is there any way I can come back to it after taking a load in, or is it by complete chance?
What is the best way to deal with those odd lots in the refinery that don't make up a complete ton of material, once you are finished mining ( either because your cargo bay is full or you run out of collector limpets )?