What to do with an asteroid passing close to Kerbin

[TheFlyingKerman]

I found a class C asteroid going to reach PE of 5500km in about 100 Kerbin days. Currently I am not mining within Kerbin SOI. Ideas?

[FrostedShoe]

Unless it's going to smash into the space centre, I would set up a good vantage point, grab some popcorn and watch it. If it is going to smash into the space centre and you don't have the claw, try shooting rockets at it.

[Blaarkies]

You could roleplay Armageddon with it...

[Cpt Kerbalkrunch]

If you've got four and a half minutes (and some headphones, preferably), check this out. It was a lot of fun.

 

[steuben]

... put it in the longboat till it`s sober </salty sea shanty>

The only thing I can recommend is capture it, and use it as the core of fueling depot in Kerbin orbit.

[Geschosskopf]

8 hours ago, TheFlyingKerman said:

I found a class C asteroid going to reach PE of 5500km in about 100 Kerbin days. Currently I am not mining within Kerbin SOI. Ideas?

Well, mining asteroids in Kerbin's SOI has the same drawbacks as mining Minmus:   The effort involved is not worth the money saved on fuel.  But if you the goal of your game is to build out the Kerbin system (and nowhere else) with bases, stations, and whatnot, then adding an asteroid to the mix spices things up a bit.  Otherwise, unless you have a contract to get science from or capture a Class C asteroid, with no fine print that makes the project impractical, and which pays substantially more than you'll spend on doing it, then it's probably best to ignore it.  5500km Pe is no threat at all to Kerbin, and AFAIK asteroids aren't a threat even on an impact course.

Edited December 11, 2017 by Geschosskopf

[Corona688]

If you can catch it while it's still quite far away, you can easily make long-term changes to its course, intercept the mun, and ultimately get captured into orbit around Kerbin for almost free.  It won't be a stable orbit, as the moon will intercept it again someday and throw it out, but the mun can do a lot of the work for you.

3 hours ago, Geschosskopf said:

Well, mining asteroids in Kerbin's SOI has the same drawbacks as mining Minmus:   The effort involved is not worth the money saved on fuel.

I could see that on an asteroid which will run out someday, but on Minmus, which is effectively infinite, why not?

11 hours ago, FrostedShoe said:

Unless it's going to smash into the space centre, I would set up a good vantage point, grab some popcorn and watch it. If it is going to smash into the space centre and you don't have the claw, try shooting rockets at it.

5500km is somewhat outside kerbostationary orbit.  It won't hit anything.

Edited December 11, 2017 by Corona688

[GuyWithGlasses]

8 hours ago, Cpt Kerbalkrunch said:

If you've got four and a half minutes (and some headphones, preferably), check this out. It was a lot of fun.

 

Best cricket play ever xD

 

[Geschosskopf]

9 minutes ago, Corona688 said:

I could see that on an asteroid which will run out someday, but on Minmus, which is effectively infinite, why not?

It all depends on what the focus of your game is.  If all you're doing is staying in Kerbin's SOI, then sure, mining Minmus and asteroids in the Kerbin system is all part of that. But if you're going to focus elsewhere, and can do so in a big way, you can easily afford the fuel to do that from the surface of Kerbin.  Then you don't waste any time mucking about building bases and schlepping fuel around the Kerbin system, and can instead spend all your time doing what you're really interested in.

[FrostedShoe]

34 minutes ago, Corona688 said:

 

5500km is somewhat outside kerbostationary orbit.  It won't hit anything.

Misread it... doh!

[Spricigo]

 

47 minutes ago, Corona688 said:

I could see that on an asteroid which will run out someday, but on Minmus, which is effectively infinite, why not?

Well, the OP is not mining in Minmus. Mining in an asteroid have most, if not all, of the drawbacks of Minmus plus the fact that will run out of mineral someday.  In that light why should he start to mine asteroids when Minmus is more convenient and he dont explore it? There are people that can come up with reason that work for then, but the question is: There is a reason that works for the OP? None that is evident to me.

Personally I consider that a Mining base on Minmus is only worth if, among other things, the player use it to frequently send Vessels in interplanetary missions. Even then the advantage is questionable, as @Geschosskopf pointed out, one can afford a lot of fuel for interplanetary travel without messing with bases and kerbin-minmus transfers.

[Zeiss Ikon]

1 hour ago, Spricigo said:

Mining in an asteroid have most, if not all, of the drawbacks of Minmus plus the fact that will run out of mineral someday.@Geschosskopf pointed out, one can afford a lot of fuel for interplanetary travel without messing with bases and kerbin-minmus transfers.

There's an understatement.  In my science game (which I haven't opened in a while), I captured a 998 T asteroid, parked it in Kerbin orbit (eccentric and inclined, but inside the Mun's orbit), launched a drill/refinery and some tanks to it -- and sucked it dry in about 100 days, without even filling the empty tanks I'd sent to it (four oranges and a couple adapter tanks).  Not sure whether that was because the drill and fuel converter were running on fuel cells at first (the fuel I obtained provided the energy to mine and convert the ore, as well as filling the tanks), or 83% ore in under 1000 T is just that little...

[TheFlyingKerman]

22 hours ago, Blaarkies said:

You could roleplay Armageddon with it...

I found another asteroid on collision course with Kerbin... I redirected that one away. It was harder than I thought. Clearly the first one can be safely ignored.

11 hours ago, Spricigo said:

 

Well, the OP is not mining in Minmus. Mining in an asteroid have most, if not all, of the drawbacks of Minmus plus the fact that will run out of mineral someday.  In that light why should he start to mine asteroids when Minmus is more convenient and he dont explore it? There are people that can come up with reason that work for then, but the question is: There is a reason that works for the OP? None that is evident to me.

Personally I consider that a Mining base on Minmus is only worth if, among other things, the player use it to frequently send Vessels in interplanetary missions. Even then the advantage is questionable, as @Geschosskopf pointed out, one can afford a lot of fuel for interplanetary travel without messing with bases and kerbin-minmus transfers.

 

Indeed. I am a moar SRB rocket guy. There isn't much to refuel at LKO. I am experimenting with small scale mining at Gilly and soon at Pol, though.