Yup! That's what I like to do. Setting up a station around another planet is a one way trip anyway. It's nice to repurpose the fuel tanks once you arrive. Put some docking ports on it, maybe a small lander, and a probe core so there is a lot less to take with you on the crewed mission. My problem now is that I sometimes loose the right click menu on the converted AKWW-32 lab. I probably did something wrong in the config.