Mining

[Aeryn]

Hello Commanders

I am having a little trouble with mining.

Took me a while to figure out what was needed - a mining laser and refinery, then off I pop to the nearest set of rings and started away. Low and behold minerals fall out and after about 30 minutes I had worked out how to store them in the refinery. 100% full in 3 hoppers full of the stuff .. flew back to a station to sell .. and nothing.

Question : Can you mine in a sidewinder ? My thought was that not having cargo space (as I converted that to a refinery) would perhaps be the root cause of my mining misery, but I am unsure.

Question : How do you convert minerals into things you can sell ? I hit what looked like an eject button and all my hard work promptly vanished .. not amused.

I have since then upgraded to a Hauler as it has cargo space just in case that was the problem but before I fly out again (servers down!) I figured I would ask the question.


Cheers,

Aeryn

[Flip]

I think this should answer your questions:

http://youtube.com/v/kYNip6rBkWw

[Aeryn]

I think this should answer your questions:

You're lovely - thank you very much. Watching Mr Manley as I type and the 1st new topic he covers - Mining

ETA:
Ah, now I see my mistake .. selling your cargo hold to replace with a mining device is bad as you have no where to store the minerals once mined. Ah well, live and learn

[Nemetos]

Cheers Flip !
That's saved me a bit of time.

[Avago-Earo]

Nothing much to say about mining.

Just thought I'd put my ore in.

[Jockgit64]

[Myka]

Something else that will need testing is that all the asteroids have 'sweet spots' but since there is no mining scanner yet we can only guess where that is. So, if you find one spot is giving you low yields (Less than 10%, maybe less than 15%) then try mining another spot on the asteroid until you get better yields per chunk.

Also, I've found that mining is more consistent (logical I guess!) when you concentrate your laser on one spot rather than have your laser dance around the asteroid. So I tend to check the rotation of the asteroid by shooting at it first with the mining laser and if it's automatically moving due to the asteroid, I just reposition on another axis so I'm facing a consistent surface.

Would be interested to know what other CMDRs find out!

[Zarkon]

Mining's a bit tedious and not very profitable in it's current state. However, I do think it's an excellent remake of the original mining in the first Elite. I am hoping the feature gets touched up though. Mineral scanners would be nice, but it doesn't take long to pop a chunk off of an asteroid to see what is in it. So far as I've noticed, each 'roid drops the same resources, and I usually get 6-10 chunks off each 'roid.

[Myka]

I'm sure they'll tweak it as we test it

But for now I think the best way to make money with mining is:

1 - Use at least 4 hoppers

2 - Reserve one or two of those hoppers for expensive things such as Paladium (12k ea tonne), Gold, etc.

3 - Look at the system bulletin board (or any nearby system that would buy minerals/metals) before you mine an asteroid belt. Accept missions that ask for metals/minerals that can be found in that asteroid belt, they generally give you 5-9 hours.

4 - In the System view map, each asteroid belt seems to have varying statuses so check the system map to see if the asteroid belt you are interested in is abundant in resources (e.g., pristine or some such).

* * *

Zarkon, I noticed too that each cluster of asteroid generally contain the same types of metals. So if you find a cluster that has Palladium, note it down, so you can come back later and hopefully find a rock with Palladium again for example As the cluster resets if you supercruise away or relog, basically everytime you create a new island/instance.

I've also found that there is basically no point mining with anything less than 3 hoppers in a refiner, or with a small cargo hold. (The hauler with 8 tonnes is fine though as a starting point, but don't go cheap with the refiners!)

[Mr_Average]

Keep the mining info coming ladies, I'm shite at combat and selling fish or basic meds is bloody boring.