Best place to mine for engineering materials thats *NOT* a planetary surface?

[Excessive Paranoia]

I really can't stand driving around looking for rocks on the scanner all day just to get 1-2 of the material I need. As such I'd like to try getting them in space instead, but I've been coming up empty as when I mine, I rarely get any engineering materials at all and usually only get the scanned materials from the rock. I've read that you can get loads of the lower end materials from mining like this, but I can't seem to figure out the trick. Are certain materials only found in certain types of belts? Do I need to be using a specific mining tool other than a mining laser to get better results?

Thanks

[Dave1029]

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

I really can't stand driving around looking for rocks on the scanner all day just to get 1-2 of the material I need. As such I'd like to try getting them in space instead, but I've been coming up empty as when I mine, I rarely get any engineering materials at all and usually only get the scanned materials from the rock. I've read that you can get loads of the lower end materials from mining like this, but I can't seem to figure out the trick. Are certain materials only found in certain types of belts? Do I need to be using a specific mining tool other than a mining laser to get better results?

Thanks

Unfortunantely they pretty much force you to land on planets periodically. Just grab the rare stuff and trade down.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Originally posted by Dave1029:

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

I really can't stand driving around looking for rocks on the scanner all day just to get 1-2 of the material I need. As such I'd like to try getting them in space instead, but I've been coming up empty as when I mine, I rarely get any engineering materials at all and usually only get the scanned materials from the rock. I've read that you can get loads of the lower end materials from mining like this, but I can't seem to figure out the trick. Are certain materials only found in certain types of belts? Do I need to be using a specific mining tool other than a mining laser to get better results?

Thanks

Unfortunantely they pretty much force you to land on planets periodically. Just grab the rare stuff and trade down.

So you can't get those materials unless you land?

[Dave1029]

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

Originally posted by Dave1029:

Unfortunantely they pretty much force you to land on planets periodically. Just grab the rare stuff and trade down.

So you can't get those materials unless you land?

the last tier of resources are landing only.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Originally posted by Dave1029:

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

So you can't get those materials unless you land?

the last tier of resources are landing only.

Right now I need first tier resources and I'm getting hardly any... a full hour on a pristine world with 30% sulphur and 17% phosphorus netted me 50 sulphor and 10 phosphorus... I'm trying to get Guardian tech so I'll need like 5x that amount of sulphor and 20x that amount of phosphorus to deal with grinding out the bps...

[Dave1029]

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

Originally posted by Dave1029:

the last tier of resources are landing only.

Right now I need first tier resources and I'm getting hardly any... a full hour on a pristine world with 30% sulphur and 17% phosphorus needed me 50 sulphor and 10 phosphorus... I'm trying to get Guardian tech so I'll need like 5x that amount of sulphor and 20x that amount of phosphorus to deal with grinding out the bps...

Don't focus on those. Get things like tellerium and niobin. yytrium. Then trade those down for mass amounts of tier 1 and 2 mats.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Originally posted by Dave1029:

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

Right now I need first tier resources and I'm getting hardly any... a full hour on a pristine world with 30% sulphur and 17% phosphorus needed me 50 sulphor and 10 phosphorus... I'm trying to get Guardian tech so I'll need like 5x that amount of sulphor and 20x that amount of phosphorus to deal with grinding out the bps...

Don't focus on those. Get things like tellerium and niobin. yytrium. Then trade those down for mass amounts of tier 1 and 2 mats.

I'd rather just space mine for the low end stuff and not have to deal with driving hour after hour on a planet...

[Dave1029]

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

Originally posted by Dave1029:

Don't focus on those. Get things like tellerium and niobin. yytrium. Then trade those down for mass amounts of tier 1 and 2 mats.

I'd rather just space mine for the low end stuff and not have to deal with driving hour after hour on a planet...

It's like 2-3 peices per rock. Blame fdev for not allowing this ♥♥♥♥ to be bought.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Originally posted by Dave1029:

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

I'd rather just space mine for the low end stuff and not have to deal with driving hour after hour on a planet...

It's like 2-3 peices per rock. Blame fdev for not allowing this ♥♥♥♥ to be bought.

The thing is at least its 2-3 piece per rock and I can see all the rocks in the area without having to do a treasure-hunt minigame...

[Dave1029]

Originally posted by Excessive Paranoia:

Originally posted by Dave1029:

It's like 2-3 peices per rock. Blame fdev for not allowing this ♥♥♥♥ to be bought.

The thing is at least its 2-3 piece per rock and I can see all the rocks in the area without having to do a treasure-hunt minigame...

I'm just saying it's not very effecient.

[Qrazy]

Try thargoid barnacle sites

[Physical Disconnect]

why dont you try one of the crashed anacondas ? sure its still landing on a planet but you dnt have to search for rocks or stuff. i would recommend koli discii https://canonn.science/codex/koli-discii-crashed-ship/ there are 3-4 cargo racks with antimony and thungston which you can exchange at a material trader later into that material you need. just go there -> shoot the cargo racks -> scoop the antimony or thungsten material they drop -> exit to main menu -> repeat. you can fill your full materials in one long go i guess its 150 or so for antimony and 100 for thungsten? they are grade 4 materials so pretty valuable in the material trader. most materials for exchange is at 1/6 ratio or more except for grade 5. i really hope that helps good luck commander!

[van Leeuwenhoek's mustache]

When you send a prospector limpet to an asteroid, it'll tell you the likelihood of getting mats from that asteroid.

I think the terms are: "low", "medium" and "high".

In any case, the best way of getting most mats is surface mining on SRV.

If you're having trouble finding basic mats like phosphorus and sulphur, you're doing something wrong.

Here's what you need to do:

1- Travel to metal rich planets / moons with pristine reserves and high concentrations of the mats you're looking for. Don't bother with icy / rocky planets and moons.

2- Use probes to find geologically active sites (geysers and the like).
If you find any of those, you'll have a mining feast there.

3- If you don't find any of those, you can either try your luck with other planets / moons or settle for "regular planetary mining".

4- If you decide to settle, look for big craters and valleys / canyons on the surface of the planet / moon, that's generally where you'll find higher concentrations of outcrops, mesosiderites, bronzite chondrites, etc.
In the case of craters, you'll find higher concentrations of rare mats towards the center.

Seriously, finding phosphorus, sulphur, iron, carbon, nickel, manganese, germanium, etc. is super easy.

There are way trickier mats to obtain, like technetium, ruthenium, yttrium, polonium...even selenium (sometimes), etc. These I recommend getting in geologically active sites, don't bother looking for them the usual way.

Also, take advantage of material traders in order to get lots of basic mats.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Originally posted by Gramer Natzi:

When you send a prospector limpet to an asteroid, it'll tell you the likelihood of getting mats from that asteroid

I think the terms are: "low", "medium" and "high".

In any case, the best way of getting most mats is surface mining on SRV.

If you're having trouble finding basic mats like phosphorus and sulphur, you're doing something wrong.

Here's what you need to do:

1- Travel to metal rich planets / moons with pristine reserves and high concentrations of those mats (there are plenty of those).

2- Use probes to find geologically active sites (geysers and the like).
If you find any of those, you'll have a mining feast there.

3- If you don't find any of those, you can either try your luck with other planets / moons or settle for "regular planetary mining".

4- If you decide to settle, look for big craters and valleys / canyons on the surface of the planet / moon, that's generally where you'll find higher concentrations of outcrops, mesosiderites, bronzite chondrites, etc.
In the case of craters, you'll find higher concentrations of rate mats towards the center.

Seriously, finding phosphorus, sulphur, iron, carbon, nickel, manganese, germanium, etc. is super easy.

There are way trickier mats to obtain, like technetium, ruthenium, yttrium, polonium...even selenium (sometimes), etc. These I recommend getting in geologically active sites, don't bother looking for them the usual way.

See... nowhere at any point have I read that you should look near geological sites and there would be a higher concentration of materials...

[van Leeuwenhoek's mustache]

@Excessive Paranoia

That's because you haven't googled "Elite Dangerous planetary mining":
http://remlok-industries.fr/4023/the-surface-mining-guide/?lang=en

Btw, I forgot to mention that the age of the main star also seems to play a role.
The younger the star, the better.

PS. I don't know how up to date that guide is.
Also, I haven't tried surface mining in 3.3 yet, things might've changed.
Those tips worked pretty well in 3.2

[primobrainlet]

I have not gone out there myself yet, but I have a hunch that those floating space tree fruits mentioned in the codex might contain something nice, alongside the floating crystals