Newcomer / Intro There must be a quicker way to get Tritium

[Ultra Fluffy]

I'm in the process of taking my fleet carrier for a road trip into the black. It has two ships on board at the moment, an explorer and a miner. The problem is that all this jumping is using up tritium and the mining I am doing takes forever and is SO BORING.

I am currently doing surface mining in tritium hotspots that I come across. My mining ship is a Python with:

• Three 6E cargo holds (192 tonnes tolal capacity)
• 5A collector limpet controller (3 limpets on the go at once)
• 3A refinery (8 bins)
• 3A prospector limpet controller
• Two 2D mining lasers
• 2B seismic charge launcher
• 1D abrasion blaster
• 7D power distributor
• 7A power plant
• Some other stuff

So it is more than capable of cutting the surface, waiting for the collector limpets to collect and then moving onto the next rock. I start off with 180 limpets and I have no problem finding asteroids with 5,10, 25 and sometimes 33% tritium, but it still takes me 4 hours to fill up the cargo holds, enough for 2, 3 or 4 jumps. I have developed a technique for not going over ground I have been on before. If I fill up the cargo holds and the refinery then I waste limpets to make space. I've tried looking for mother loads, but never found any tritium ones. Do they actually exist? Never done sub-surface mining. I don't think I have the right equipment. There is nobody around to donate it to me. I'm nowhere near a starport, so I can't buy any.

There must be a quicker way to collect tritium. I just want to get on with the exploring. Taking the fleet carrier for Vista Genomics, repaits etc. Happy to wander great distances from the fleet carrier and then come back to it via a different route, But I want to get the fleet carrier to the other side of the galaxy. I know I can use DSSA carriers, but would rather take mine for the ride.

Do I need to engineer something? Should I be doing asteroid cracking or sub-surface mining instead?

 

[SteveWW57]

If It had been me, I would have filled up with tritium before setting off.

Steve

 

[Astaran]

I'm in the process of taking my fleet carrier for a road trip into the black. It has two ships on board at the moment, an explorer and a miner. The problem is that all this jumping is using up tritium and the mining I am doing takes forever and is SO BORING.

I am currently doing surface mining in tritium hotspots that I come across. My mining ship is a Python with:

• Three 6E cargo holds (192 tonnes tolal capacity)
• 5A collector limpet controller (3 limpets on the go at once)
• 3A refinery (8 bins)
• 3A prospector limpet controller
• Two 2D mining lasers
• 2B seismic charge launcher
• 1D abrasion blaster
• 7D power distributor
• 7A power plant
• Some other stuff

So it is more than capable of cutting the surface, waiting for the collector limpets to collect and then moving onto the next rock. I start off with 180 limpets and I have no problem finding asteroids with 5,10, 25 and sometimes 33% tritium, but it still takes me 4 hours to fill up the cargo holds, enough for 2, 3 or 4 jumps. I have developed a technique for not going over ground I have been on before. If I fill up the cargo holds and the refinery then I waste limpets to make space. I've tried looking for mother loads, but never found any tritium ones. Do they actually exist? Never done sub-surface mining. I don't think I have the right equipment. There is nobody around to donate it to me. I'm nowhere near a starport, so I can't buy any.

There must be a quicker way to collect tritium. I just want to get on with the exploring. Taking the fleet carrier for Vista Genomics, repaits etc. Happy to wander great distances from the fleet carrier and then come back to it via a different route, But I want to get the fleet carrier to the other side of the galaxy. I know I can use DSSA carriers, but would rather take mine for the ride.

Do I need to engineer something? Should I be doing asteroid cracking or sub-surface mining instead?

If you're still within reach of the Bubble you should return asap and fill your FC with Tritium from the market. I'm currently preparing an FC based expedition myself and I will buy ALL the Tritium needed for the journey (both way, plus some spare Tritium "just in case") before making the first jump. I only mine Tritium to break up the monotony of deep space exploration. But you never ever want to be dependent on Tritium mining to finish your journey

As for mining, I use two different ships. A mining Python with Sub-Surface mining equipment and a Cutter. for pure Laser mining There are Sub-Surface Deposits of Tritium in some asteroids and they can give some good yield. But mining Tritium will take time (as I said, better do it as a side activity when you "feel like it")

Edit: When you're taking your FC out for exploration, I recommend also bringing some additional ships for exploration, just to play around with different ships from time to time. For me, it helps keeping things fresh. One day I take a "proper" exploration ship like my AspX or Krait Phantom, sometimes I take a Keelback, Chieftain or an Imperial Courier.

Edit 2: My Mining Python, not optimized, but it's working good enough for me. A small refinery is enough when you add anything but Tritium (or whatever you want to mine at that moment) to the ignore list of your limpets

Class 6 Cargo Rack
Class 6 Cargo Rack
Class 6 Cargo Rack
Class 5A Collector Limpet Controller
Class 5A Collector Limpet Controller
Class 4 Cargo Rack
Class 3A Prospector Limpet Controller
Class 3A Prismatic Shield Generator
Class 2A Refinery
Class 1 Detailed Surface Scanner

Lightweight Alloy
Class 6A Power Plant G4 Overcharged
Class 6A Thrusters G5 Dirty Tuning
Class 5A Frame Shift Drive G4 Increased FSD Range
Class 4D Life Support
Class 7A Power Distributor G5 Weapon Focus
Class 6D Sensors
Class 5C Fuel Tank

Class 2D Mining Laser
Class 2D Mining Laser
Class 2D Mining Laser
Class 2B Sub-Surface Displacement Missile
Class 1D Abrasion Blaster

Class 0A Shield Booster
Class 0A Shield Booster
Class 0A Shield Booster
Class 0A Pulse Wave Analyser

 

[Ultra Fluffy]

If It had been me, I would have filled up with tritium before setting off.

Steve

Yes, I started out with 1000 in the tank, but didn't appreciate that I could also put it in the cargo hold as well. Seriously considering going back to the bubble to fill up the cargo hold.

 

[SteveWW57]

I took a trip to Colonia and back, with about 20,000 tons. Used it all up in a later CG.

And you can pay people to fill the carrier with tritium.

Steve

 

[Ashnak]

There are.

• mine Platium and buy Tritium
• pay other players to supply you with Tritium (from a nearby market)
• pay other FC owners to ship Tritium to you (that one's going to be expensive, though)

 

[Ultra Fluffy]

Yes, I started out with 1000 in the tank, but didn't appreciate that I could also put it in the cargo hold as well. Seriously considering going back to the bubble to fill up the cargo hold.

18 Jumps back to bubble according to Spansh. That will use up all my tritium. How easy is it to buy tritium from starports? What is the best sit to use for up to date quantaties available? Do I need to ferry is using my Python or can I get sent to my carrier?

 

[Astaran]

18 Jumps back to bubble according to Spansh. That will use up all my tritium. How easy is it to buy tritium from starports? What is the best sit to use for up to date quantaties available? Do I need to ferry is using my Python or can I get sent to my carrier?

You could set up a buy order at your FC and hope that other CMDR will help you filling the FC up or you fly back and forth yourself

I strongly recommend using a dedicated Tritium hauler like a Type-9 (or Cutter, if you can buy one), since it will save you a lot of runs compared to a Python

You can use Inara to look for a station with a large supply of Tritium

Commodity search [INARA]

The companion site for Elite:Dangerous. Market data, CMDR's logs, squadrons, logbooks, galleries, powerplay, engineers, blueprints, crafting, galaxy info, news and more...

inara.cz

 

[Ashnak]

18 Jumps back to bubble according to Spansh. That will use up all my tritium. How easy is it to buy tritium from starports? What is the best sit to use for up to date quantaties available? Do I need to ferry is using my Python or can I get sent to my carrier?

• as easy as buying anything else form the market
• EDDB.io is as good as it gets. Which is as good as the players supplying the data let it get (see EDMC and EDDiscovery)
• you need to ferry it yourself or get other people to ferry it to you. A T-9 or Cutter is usually the best for this job. If you want others tzo load you up, set your Carrier name to "buying tritium at ...kCr/t", enable access for all, set up a buy order on your market and park next to a high supply station.

 

[GroG79]

18 Jumps back to bubble according to Spansh. That will use up all my tritium. How easy is it to buy tritium from starports? What is the best sit to use for up to date quantaties available? Do I need to ferry is using my Python or can I get sent to my carrier?

I hope you make it with the tritium you have!

sub surface mining yields most tritium per hour. 200 ton if you are really good. Buying the tritium is the way to go. Mining one hour for one just is just horrible imo
You might be able to buy some tritium at the Colonia bridge. And yes, get a cargo ship and use it to load your your carrier.

 

[SteveWW57]

18 Jumps back to bubble according to Spansh. That will use up all my tritium. How easy is it to buy tritium from starports? What is the best sit to use for up to date quantaties available? Do I need to ferry is using my Python or can I get sent to my carrier?

Park next to a station that is a refinery. Minimal transfer distance. Set a buy order, and with tritium going for 50,000 a ton, a buy price 75,000 a ton or up will see you filled up.

 

[Astaran]

Ah, just a word of caution if you buy a Cutter. The Auto Dock/Auto undock flies like a drunken Squirrel on Crystal Meth and will constantly(!) crash into the station and/or will take ages in awkward landing approaches at your carrier.

 

[Red Anders]

First thing I'd say is if it's taking you four hours to fill the hold of a Python, your miner is terrible. You want a hell of a lot more collectors (8+ ideally but 6 at an absolute minimum) to mine faster - I can usually fill my hold in about an hour mining tritium in a hotspot. I realise that's no help to you right now but when you next reach civilisation, get prepared with the tools for the job.

 

[GroG79]

Ah, just a word of caution if you buy a Cutter. The Auto Dock/Auto undock flies like a drunken Squirrel on Crystal Meth and will constantly(!) crash into the station and/or will take ages in awkward landing approaches at your carrier.

Stop boosting towards the station if you can not fly a cutter yourself

 

[Astaran]

Stop boosting towards the station if you can not fly a cutter yourself

Docking at the station is no issue for the auto dock, starting is. And with some 2000+ hours in Elite, I think I am proficient enough to start and land any ship in the game without any issue. As a matter of fact, I've done it so many times, that I like to delegate such mundane tasks to the autopilot while I set a course or spam in the forums

 

[Ashnak]

On the plus side, nothing and nobody (except maybe another Cutter) is going to stop you going through the mailslot on manual, as long as you keep below 100 m/s.

Admittedly, that's with only 640 tons of cargo space and everything else packed with a shield generator, shield boosters and Guardian shield reinforcements.

 

[Ultra Fluffy]

First thing I'd say is if it's taking you four hours to fill the hold of a Python, your miner is terrible. You want a hell of a lot more collectors (8+ ideally but 6 at an absolute minimum) to mine faster - I can usually fill my hold in about an hour mining tritium in a hotspot. I realise that's no help to you right now but when you next reach civilisation, get prepared with the tools for the job.

Or it could be me that is terrible at mining - Just started doing it (and not liking it). Sounds like I need a bigger ship to fit more collector limpet controllers.

 

[Ashnak]

Try this:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

You want the 7a Distributor, ideally G5 charge enhanced/super conduits, to run three mining lasers simultaneously. You can step down on the power plant size, depending on what else you want to put in the utility slots (that pulse wave analyzer uses a lot of power). Otherwise, you'll get up to 10 collectors this way, which should be enough to keep up with the three lasers in most situations.

 

[Faded Glory]

I'm not the biggest fan of mining - hadn't even unlocked the engineer that requires 50 tons or something - but despite that, I've found mining for tritium (while on an exploration trip) to be Ok, even with the issues with the pulse wave analyzer. I also have a Python set up as a miner. I did start with around 13,000 tons on board, bought while in the bubble, but even so I've actually mined more tritium than I've used so far on the trip.

Surface mining tritium is slow, ideally you want to play the sub-surface mining game which yields far more tritium and is certainly more engaging. No tritium to be had from cores, but look for core asteroids (at least in a tritium hotspot) and they will usually have a couple of sub-surface deposits of tritium and usually a couple of surface deposits that can be had with the abrasion blaster. I can usually get around a hundred tons in a little over an hour. You'll need to find very brightly glowing asteroids using the pulse wave analyzer which will be cores of void opals or low temp diamonds (which you can either mine or ignore, I ignore them) even though it's a tritium hotspot, and they almost always have a number of tritium deposits.

I have a collector limpet that can have three active at a time and I find that plenty for sub-surface and surface deposits although if you do mining laser work it's a bit slow.

As I mentioned, mining is far from my favorite activity, but I find it a decent change of pace from exploring. So far on this trip I have found tritium hotspots on nearly every jump, usually no more than two jumps in my mining Python from the carrier. I explore up and down from my carrier, and usually do a couple of mining sessions to break it up which will typically net me a little over 200 tons of tritium, and since I'm using about 105 tons per jump I'm actually increasing my tritium store.

 

[nemolomen]

18 Jumps back to bubble according to Spansh. That will use up all my tritium. How easy is it to buy tritium from starports? What is the best sit to use for up to date quantaties available? Do I need to ferry is using my Python or can I get sent to my carrier?

There's also the Tritium Monkeys Fuel Service - you pay them roughly market average plus either 25 or 50% IIRC, and they deliver to you. You have to park in their refueling system, which changes with the BGS...

The Tritium Monkeys Fuel Service | Elite:Dangerous | INARA

The companion site for Elite:Dangerous with the game database, market data, trade routes, outfitting, engineers, blueprints, crafting, Thargoid war, squadrons, logbooks, galleries, galaxy information and much more...

inara.cz