Trying Kethane Mining on Laythe, via robotics... Help with my mass/balance problem!

[troyn123]

Hey all! I've set up a reasonably reusable space program in the Jool system, with a Kethane mining operation on Bop, a nuclear powered tug to haul it to a space station in Laythe orbit, and small reusable VTOL-SSTO vehicles to ferry crew back and forth between the ground base and the orbital base, blah blah blah... But I wanted to take it a step further, and set up a fueling station on the ground on Laythe, but most of the deposits I see are under the water! No problem, build a floating mining rig, right? FAIL. It doesn't actually extract kethane unless the drills contact the ground.

So I added a bunch of telescoping sections (via the MagicSmokeIndustries robotics package) and put the drills on the end of those. It looked promising at first, a bunch of sequential parachutes brought it down safely, but it seemed to be riding a bit high in the water... As I extended the drills down, instead of pushing them down into the water, it pushed the rig up into the air!

http://imgur.com/a/jAz5F

By far, the majority of the mass was above the drills, so this isn't exactly what I would have expected... Is there a hard limit to how deep something can go in KSP? Do I just need to make it heavier?

[NGTOne]

Well, you've got a few different options. I've seen mining rigs using modified versions of KAS, or you could just submerge and surface the whole bloody thing like a submarine using Hooligan Labs' buoyancy parts (be careful - crush depth is 500m BSL). Alternatively (though I'm really just joking) try flipping the rig on its back, and extending the pistons into the air - maybe they'll push it underwater!

[troyn123]

Well, you've got a few different options. I've seen mining rigs using modified versions of KAS, or you could just submerge and surface the whole bloody thing like a submarine using Hooligan Labs' buoyancy parts (be careful - crush depth is 500m BSL).

Hmm, I'll have to give that one a try. Hopefully that'll do the trick...

Alternatively (though I'm really just joking) try flipping the rig on its back, and extending the pistons into the air - maybe they'll push it underwater!

I actually already tried that one on accident, while dialing in the parachute sequence. It didn't work either. ;-)

[troyn123]

Woo! The submarine approach seems to be working. Hopefully it will still have enough ballast to go back to the surface after it's full of Kethane... We'll see! For anyone curious:

http://imgur.com/a/9SsW1