Mining drills get nothing but dirt

[Ekaton]

I've tried a wide variety of mining drills and different places which all show as raremetal deposits according to the map, but I get nothing but dirt. Is there any special technique I need to use or any mod I need to install? I do have all the community mods as well as mods by USI, but I can't find anything. I can see those ores on the map too, and it shows about 5% richness.

 

S1, S2 and S3 separators all show as dirt. Everything shows as inactive or nothing to harvest. My engineer can interact with the drill and attempt to change S1,2 or 3 to something else, but I'm missing specialized parts and material kits - how can I get those? Would that help?

Edited December 10, 2017 by Ekaton

[voicey99]

You can cycle through their bits in the VAB before you launch, but you have to deploy them to do that (for whatever reason). To swap them out in-flight, you have to have specparts/matkits nearby, which you can ship in from Kerbin or manufacture onsite with MKS parts.