[Spoilers?] Location^3

[Malachai]

EDIT: Now spoiler free!

You know what they say, it's all about location.

Yes, in this edition of Malachai Begs for Help, we're discussing location for a Mun base!

Here's the deal: I've mapped the surface of the Mun for kethane, as well as with the ISA MapSat. Before I started sending down habs and such for my base (because I'm not putting that off due to the need for heavy planning. Not at all), I sent down a new rover to scout out the locations. I quickly learned, though, that while the maps are small, the distances are huge. Somehow traveling at ~15m/s makes traveling to a specific spot on the map an ordeal. Here's my maps:

This is my kethane map, blown up to 2x

This is my surface map AND kethane map merged into one (again, 2x).

The little circle shows roughly where I wanted to put the base. On first glance, it seems like a good spot. Right smack in between 4 large deposits. But when I tried traveling from said spot to one of the deposits, it took forever. So I'm wondering where I should put the base. How close to a deposit is too close? How far is too far? It should be noted that I've got mobile miners and refiners waiting in the wings, so I can place the base a little out of the way. But I don't think I want to spend half an hour tapping W and B over and over, so I don't want it THAT out of the way.

So what do you folks think? Wise words from those who've been there go a long way.

OH! And before I forget again:

I was also thinking of setting up a "science base" at the black X to "study" anomalies. This was my original location for my mining operation before the other site got totally mapped. As you can see*, there's a number of anomalies around the proposed landing site, but once again, distances are pretty harsh. So advice there would help as well.

*And now you can't see. Just trust me, they're there.

Edited May 7, 2013 by Malachai
Because some people can't read things in brackets

[Deadpangod3]

You shouldn't post the locations of Easter eggs, it ruins the enjoyment of discovering it for newbie players if they know where they are (I haven't even discovered half of them, only ones I've seen are a munar arch, and the monoliths at ksc)

[thes50]

You shouldn't post the locations of Easter eggs, it ruins the enjoyment of discovering it for newbie players if they know where they are (I haven't even discovered half of them, only ones I've seen are a munar arch, and the monoliths at ksc)

Well, he did write "SPOILERS" in the title. What were you expecting?

[Malachai]

*Sighs* Fine, since illiteracy is apparently an issue on this forum, I'll edit it now.

[Bigant]

i would probs drop right into the middle of the large deposit to the left of your black X can get on with mining and exploring at the same time. as you say the distances are huge and it takes forever to get from one place to another should be plenty to mine there for a good while

[astocky]

Just noth-east of the circle you have highlighted there are 4 kethane deposits that are even closer together. The terrain is probably not as ideal, but as they are much closer to the equator getting the kethane / fuel to a station or similar in orbit would be much easier.

[falofonos]

Drop your kethane mining station onto the largest deposit you can find near the equator.

Leave the refinery in equatorial orbit with processor and tankage and lots of solar cells. In fact, the mining units use more power than refining but hey, solar cells look nice. If you want to get fancy, you could put the refinery station in geosynch orbit above the mining unit.

Use a lifter to carry the kethane from surface to refinery and your refueling station is operational. The lifter itself is just an empty tank and a few nerva rockets, so relatively low mass and easily replaced if it litho-breaks at some point.

If you don't like docking, you could get the lazor system and stick yellow lasers on everything and remote transfer the resources.

Much easier to rendezvous in orbit than repeatedly land safely near your mining colony, in my humbly pinion.

[Malachai]

Just noth-east of the circle you have highlighted there are 4 kethane deposits that are even closer together. The terrain is probably not as ideal, but as they are much closer to the equator getting the kethane / fuel to a station or similar in orbit would be much easier.

Good eye! I'll send a probe down there to scout it out. See, kids, this is why you don't run your ground survey missions at 5am when you can't sleep!

Drop your kethane mining station onto the largest deposit you can find near the equator.

Leave the refinery in equatorial orbit with processor and tankage and lots of solar cells. In fact, the mining units use more power than refining but hey, solar cells look nice. If you want to get fancy, you could put the refinery station in geosynch orbit above the mining unit.

Use a lifter to carry the kethane from surface to refinery and your refueling station is operational. The lifter itself is just an empty tank and a few nerva rockets, so relatively low mass and easily replaced if it litho-breaks at some point.

If you don't like docking, you could get the lazor system and stick yellow lasers on everything and remote transfer the resources.

Much easier to rendezvous in orbit than repeatedly land safely near your mining colony, in my humbly pinion.

Good idea. I'll work on a refining station later, and research geosynch orbits as well. A shame, though since my mobile refinery looked badass. I guess I could just remove one of the empty fuel tanks and put another kethane tank on it, though.

EDIT:

Quick question: what does "nerva" mean? Is it the atomic rocket? I've seen the term thrown around a few times, but I'm still fuzzy on it. I guess I'm still a noob in that regard.

Edited May 7, 2013 by Malachai

[Pursuedtank]

Just to say you won't be able to put something in a synchronous orbit around the Mun as the altitude of synchronous orbit, 2 970.56 km is outside the Mun's sphere of influence. However the rest of it sounds good.

Nerva (which stands for Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application) is what the Nuclear engine is generally called although it is actually called the LV-N Atomic Rocket Engine.

Edited May 7, 2013 by Pursuedtank

[Promii]

Quick question: what does "nerva" mean? Is it the atomic rocket? I've seen the term thrown around a few times, but I'm still fuzzy on it. I guess I'm still a noob in that regard.

Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application

[CalculusWarrior]

I'm in the same situation, I'm afraid. Right now I'm driving a rover from my (Spoilers, highlight to read) Armstrong Memorial Base to a Kethane deposit that I thought was right next door, but is evidently not. I'm planning on using rocket-propelled fuel transport vehicles that can fly back and forth, or else I'll make sure that my rovers are really stable and use Mechjeb's Rover Autopilot and go read a book or something.

I was considering editing the Kethane savefile to move the Kethane closer, but that's cheating and I have no idea how to do anything like that

[falofonos]

Ah, well i only got the idea for the geostationary orbit from the lazor mod achievement list.

If you have your mobile refinery designed and ready to fly then may as well send it out. If it's mobile then landing precision isn't as big a deal and you can still use a lifter to move the fuel up, if needed.

My "plan" was to set up a refinery on minmus and stock up some sort of orbital fuel depot to fill up my Jool vehicle. The refinery is working but I am having some difficulties working out what to send to jool and without a payload... the transit vehicle is hard to design.

[Malachai]

Well, I've already started setting up a massive refining station. It'll be in a reasonbally low orbit around the Mun (~30km), and will serve as an all-in-one gas station for my manned (kerballed?) trip to Duna. Beyond that, I may set up a much smaller (in terms of habs pods) station around Minimus. We'll see when we get there. Right now this is all very much a learning thing.

Look out for a post about the station tomorrow-ish.