Kethane. Where and how do I find it.

[Goatgas]

And how do you mine and convert it for use?

[Zephram Kerman]

Wow, fifteen minutes and this hasn't been answered yet!

Here's what you need to do:

• first put a kethane scanner on a satellite to search for kethane deposits;

• make another vehicle with kethane tanks, drills, and some source of ElectricCharge;

• convert the kethane to LiquidFuel or whatever you need.

Easier said than done, of course. There are all kinds of engineering challenges, but that's part of the fun of KSP.

[elkar]

OK so, its actually very easy-realistic procedure.

Finding kethane:

1) Make a probe with scanner on it,

2) launch it to planet or moon you want to mine kethane (kethane itself is on all planets and moons except for Jool and Kerbol),

3) park it at inclinated orbit (the more you inclinate it to 90°, the more complete coverage of surface you will get, but its also slower)

4) start scanning, you can time warp with that and also click on show map (GUI on scanner) to see where and how big are those deposits

5) pick up deposit (recommended its close to equator) and write down coordinates. Those are in east and north coordinates, so 15°,20° means 15N,20E, if its negative like -15 and -20 its actually 15S, 20W.

Mining:

1) design of mining ship/rover is important, drills have to connected to kethane tank and converter have to be connected to kethane tank and fuel tank shhould be connected too, its the easiest way how to build it.

2) get your miner to that spot, you wrote down. You can place scanner on that to see if you are landing at kethane deposit in case you are not using landing autopilots.

3) converting is done just by using convertor, its best to convert only one kind of fuel at the time.

Also for design, some say its better to mine kethane and get it to orbit to process it there to fuel, some also say its better to mine > process it on surface and get it to orbit then in tanker ship.

[Goatgas]

What mods are needed?

[Dem Wot Goz Ub]

The Kethane mod, obviously.

Aside from that, nothing's needed -- MechJeb makes it easier (too easy, in my opinion) to land on deposits, but that's just about it. I don't have problems landing on Kethane deposits without MJ, but it's not for inexperienced pilots.

[Umlüx]

i am also in the process of designing a good kethane miner. but i have bad experiences, using MJ to autoland.

i can easily land the ship manually somewhat near the target (as in +/- several km's ) but MJ crashed my ship every time....

[elkar]

i am also in the process of designing a good kethane miner. but i have bad experiences, using MJ to autoland.

i can easily land the ship manually somewhat near the target (as in +/- several km's ) but MJ crashed my ship every time....

in that case, just turn off landing AP in the final descending stage and do the rest manually or using translatron. Therefore you will be very close to your target with MJ precise steering and you will land.

Also in latest dev build they say this landing bug is fixed (horizontal speed bug)

[DMagic]

Within several km's of the target is fine for kethane, as long as you pick somewhere near the center of the deposit. Put a scanner on your miner just to make sure that you are still over a deposit if you aren't sure.

And if Mechjeb is constantly crashing your lander that probably means you don't have a good design (it can still crash with a good design, but not all the time). I've found that really heavy landers without enough RCS or torque can give MJ problems, sometimes it will freak out in the final stages of landing when it tries to remove all horizontal velocity and crash. Crafts that have a really odd shape (really elongated in one dimension, or unstable and wobbly) can be difficult, too.

[Umlüx]

i know that freaking out in the final phase.. mine often starts looping like crazy. so there should be enough RCS power.

the problem is that it doesnt slow down. or not fast enough. it is coming down nice and good, slowing down a little.. but then crashing into the surface.

well... i just have to exercise manual landing some more i think...

[entaran]

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/23979-Kethane-Pack-0-6-1-Multiple-resources-support-generator-Dev-stream-recording-up

[Goatgas]

Ok, I found Kethane mod. Do I need mapsat also on satellite in order to see results?