why isn't my comet a comet?

[minerbat]

i tracked a class h object in the tracking station (there should really be a way to filter on object class) and i send a craft to it using alt-f12 to experiment with it for a possible future mission to a comet. but it didn't have any tail, even though it was around kerbins orbit and when i use alt-f12 to bring it lower than moho it still didnt get one. if i send a drill, it shows the option "start asteroid harvester" and doesnt say anything about comet harvester. i tried a g class one i found but same problem. i dont know if this is a bug or if i am doing something wrong, but i assume its the second one. so how do the comets work?

[Mythos]

Well, asteroid and comets are different things. It's not that one turns into a comet when it is close enough. It needs to be a comet to begin with.

[minerbat]

@Mythosyes so i thought. but h and g class objects should be comets right?

[Mythos]

7 minutes ago, minerbat said:

h and g class objects should be comets right?

Actually I don't know, but asteroids are class A to E. And according to this, that seems to be correct:

 

[minerbat]

so then why do i get asteroids when the tracking station says i have a class h or g?

[Guest]

There was a bug in the original release whereby the comet harvester wouldn’t work. Perhaps they just removed the option rather than fixing it. Not sure about tail but maybe it only renders from a distance or something.

[Streetwind]

Whether or not the object is a comet depends primarily on its orbit, not on its size.

If its orbit closely matches that of a celestial body, it is an asteroid. For example, the kind of asteroids that the level 3 tracking station discovers. They all hug Kerbin's orbit around the sun very closely.

If, by contrast, it has an orbit that swings up past Jool and dips down past Eve? That is a comet.

Once you are sure that you are tracking a comet, note that the tail depends on how close it is to the sun. In the upper part of its orbit, closer to apoapsis, it will not show a tail. When it swings around to approach the sun again, it will eventually start showing one.