Guide / Tutorial The popular guide to mining.

[carazvan]

Great guide which covers all aspects well.

P.S. Page 8 has a typo saying lepidolite instead of bentrandite for Metal-Rich rings.

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

Great guide which covers all aspects well.

P.S. Page 8 has a typo saying lepidolite instead of bentrandite for Metal-Rich rings.

Good show, I can't believe that snuck in there for so long! Corrected, and have a cookie.

 

[CrushBug]

Hey, I love this guide, but is there any way you could modify the first slide/page to indicate a version or a Last Updated date? It feels like there have been some changes since I first read it, but I cannot be sure.

Thanks!

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

Hey, I love this guide, but is there any way you could modify the first slide/page to indicate a version or a Last Updated date? It feels like there have been some changes since I first read it, but I cannot be sure.

Thanks!

You got your wish! I did an update today and indicated the 'last update'... In Elite timeframe for immersion, silly, I know.

-I've found out that 'D' grade collectors are excellent, I've redesigned all the ships with them.
-Need to add the type-10 miner ASAP.
-A new page for 'bizarre' ship designs, including a mining explorer I'm currently flying (Might be handy for DW2)
-A mention to cleanup materials before takeoff, gawd we pick up a lot of materials doing this stuff!


If anyone can try a ship with three class 2 mining lasers and a 7A distributor, can you tell me if you can whack a rock in one volley?

 

[CMDR MRMAURICE]

Can I just clarify that, mining in a Res site yields no better results than anywhere else on a ring??

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

According to the pros, the chunks and percents of minerals will be the same, but more chunks will come out. So you could get, say, 8 tons out of a good 'roid instead of 4-5 tons.
I haven't -thoroughly- tested this, having only once or twice risked res mining, but I did get noteworthy tonnage when I did.

And one has to be within 20km of the res zone center, apparently.

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

April 26th, I've done a little update. Now that we have a nifty 'ignore' mechanic in the contacts, it was worth pointing it out before the old 'cleaning the refinery' tricks.

Also, I've changed most uses of the word 'chunk' in favor of using 'fragment', like the game does in the contact list.

 

[BuddyE]

If anyone can try a ship with three class 2 mining lasers and a 7A distributor, can you tell me if you can whack a rock in one volley?

Not sure if if you mean stock or modded PDs.
I run a Guardian 7A PD on my Cutter with 3 class 2 miners. On 4 pips i can deplete a rock in one go. (i think about 3.5 pips is the sweet spot)
A fully engineered human PD should achieve even more.

o7

 

[mrbadexample]

excellent guide for those new to mining!

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

Thank you BuddyE,

Well, I've had a chance to try it myself, and indeed it turns out one needs an engineered power distributor in order to use three mining lasers without too much hassle.

From frequent mining, I'm quite comfortable with 6+ limpets flying around and two lasers, and good ship placement, and there's still a moment of waiting for the limpets to finish. So I daresay a ship with three lasers would need 9+ limpets to function effectively.

 

[Lieutenant Dan]

Thank you very kindly for the extremely clean, well-done guide Lance! Repped! o7

I'll be giving mining a proper go this weekend, and now I'm looking forward to it!

 

[Rat Catcher]

Thanks for a great guide - now I'll go out and give mining a quick blast...

Your presentation has removed my misgivings, although I'll Type 7 rather than go out in the Krait

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

Update done today, all those mining ship designs were getting a nudge outdated - and were pointing on the wrong site.
All fixed now.

 

[Hotshot10101]

Is there a guide or tutorial that talks about the new mining system in detail? I took a quick look at your guide and it looks like it only talks about the old way of mining.

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

The 'new way of mining' is in the future, it isn't out yet, even the beta isn't out.
Much as I'd love to, I can't teach what I haven't learnt (I'm not even in the Beta, woe is me)

 

[Hotshot10101]

The 'new way of mining' is in the future, it isn't out yet, even the beta isn't out.
Much as I'd love to, I can't teach what I haven't learnt (I'm not even in the Beta, woe is me)

For some reason I thought that was out already. Thanks. I look forward to an updated tutorial when you have it.

 

[Broxx]

I like it, are you going to up date for 3.3?

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

Well, I'm in the Beta now, and yes I'm planning to update three guides for 3.3. (exploration and planetary landings being the other two) But I may be a little late for the mining one: In the Beta the new tools are fun, but there's things that annoy pro miners about them (too many tools brings us into firegroup hell). So chances are there'll be changes between the Beta and the live, changes which I'll have to discover for myself...

bottom line: Yes I'll update this, but not necessarily super quickly... I need to properly test and adjust.

 

[Alsaril]

Thanks for the nice guide. I will try

 

[Lance 'Spacecat' D.]

Big update done for 3.3 - Beyond!

The big change is a number of new tools (seismic charges, abrasion blaster, sub-surface missiles) and explodey asteroids. From testing in Beta I garner that now there are two styles of mining:
-Core mining, blowing up asteroids to get to gems within. It is a low-tonnage, high value activity well suited to smaller ships.
-Classic laser mining, using mining lasers for metals. It is a high-tonnage, internals-intensive activity best suited to big ships.

So I wrote the guide with this split in mind, and actively advise against trying to fill 200+ tons with core mining in a big, sluggish ship. One could lose their sanity trying that. Some ships are capable of following both mining styles, the Krait II and Python come to mind.