On Thu, 6 Jun 2013, Onno Meyer wrote:
Related question -- fiction tends to blur asteroid mining craft (go
to a rock and bring raw materials home) and asteroid prospecting
craft (find viable deposits). The Traveller Seeker does both, for
example.
More likely, there is a small craft (possibly robotic?) to check the
asteroids and a larger one (manned?) to mine them. How small is a
manned prospector, and how large is a manned miner? Are prospectors
based on the miner or on a belt station?
I guess a lot depends on, what the costs of sending a ship to the belt and
around in the belt are, and how big the mining operation is.
If the costs are high, having small, possibly slow robotic drones check
out the belt, before you even consider sending a mining ship there, seems
like a good idea.
If costs are low, flying needlessly around might be less important, then
getting your returns earlier and preventing someone from snatching your
findings.
If the operation is large, you can have many vehicles and stations with
dedicated purposes.
If the operation is small, you propably have not more then one ship with
subcrafts.
In the Traveller example, costs are low and robotics discouraged. A
possible alternative for a slightly larger belting ship, would be a slow
miner with one or two small fast subcrafts as prospectors and possibly
also for landing, should the main ship not be steamlined and they still
need to get down on a backwater world for one reason or an other.
It would be still for a one ship operation.
You also could have larger mining operations there, which would lead to a
belt with population, and all operations done by non jump capable ships.
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