Space Engineers, Autominer v1 (Completely* Autonomous Mining Drone)

[@Nediac800]

I like Sage's sense of respect. For example: 20:15. He says, "More changes to the programming and all that. I say programming, but I just mean the sensor fields." He really goes out of his way to make sure that, in this case, he doesn't think changing numbers in a sensor field is programming, which would mean that programming is easy. He respects that it isn't easy, which makes him a cool guy. :)

[@Nediac800]

***** Am I supposed to be offended?

[@CommandantNOVA]

Programming is easy. Computer Science is hard. Don't confuse the two.

[@Sorestlor]

The thing is he was programming. In fact he was doing Computer science. They are not the same but it was both.

[@Sorestlor]

CommandantNOVA Programming is mostly easy. Good luck programming in binary lol. Or even assembly.

[@blade00362]

You sound like Vaas

[@cod6guy12]

You could probably stop the drones from getting stuck by making it so every couple of seconds or even minutes, the ship rotates just the slightest bit using its gryoscopes. This little bit of rotational movement could un-snag a ship, and putting the rotate 'command' on a loop would make it so the 'command' is automated, that way if a ship DOES get stuck, it will take 5 minutes tops to get unstuck.

[@Knsgf]

Normally, a drill vibration will widen the tunnel just enough to prevent ship from getting stuck, but for some reason the drill shake was removed in the latest version.

[@EctoSage]

Knsgf That explains so much, at the end when I showed my test asteroid, I had a almost completely functional drone, only thing that wasn't working was the auto-stop when it saw another small ship.. didn't add that till yesterday when I made the video.. now I know why they started getting stuck so much. (Still a bit under the weather... didn't even occur to me that the drill shake was removed, just figured I was so out of it I wasn't noticing it anymore.)

[@maxdestroyer1237]

***** he is called video sage and his picture is not that

[@VideoSage]

maxdestroyer123 Video Sage is the channel name, Ectosage... with an unfortunately lower case S is my personal account, that I end up using some times if I can't be bothered to switch accounts (Usually only one or two comments. This morning I still wasn't feeling too good, so I ended up making a fair few comments on my videos with my personal account, which is the only one I have logged in in the other room. It's a bad habit, and can lead to allot of confusion, so I'll try not to do it too much. As for the icon, since it's a personal account, I didn't feel it needed to have any branding, and I have a thing for top hats, so a fair few years ago when I originally only had my Ectosage channel, I always made a thumb nail with a Top Hat. Edit: PS, thanks for trying to defend the channel from someone who appeared to be an impostor, nice to know people care :]

[@Gassy1337]

Sage, i can't build this myself due to computer issues. I'll describe how it works the best i can. The gist of the idea is that instead of having drones work their way through the asteroid, this platform would just use an extension arm with drills on the end to mine a little into the asteroid.(yes the extension arm may uses a piston, but if the arm used 3 auxiliary pistons for stability then the extension should be fine) The drill itself would not go too deep but it would be moved from side to side, up and down by the platform in order to mine out a hole in the asteroid. This doesn't necessarily mean that the platform itself would move, i imagine that it would use pistons to move the drill arm farther out, closer in, and swing it in some direction using rotors.(I suppose it works kinda like a crane) When the sensors detect that the whole is complete the platform will simply move to the side and dig a hole right next to the previous one. close range sensors would detect the mining vicinity, when the area becomes mined out, the sensor shuts off and another sensor turns on which retracts the extension arm. The mobility part of the platform would then activate. By using sensors set to a longer range, the platform is able to keep within the general area of the asteroid. Also, i figured that having the platform try to orbit the asteroid would be to complex with all the gyroscope configurations, so instead, the platform would only move in 6 directions without rotating.( well, i suppose that it would have to rotate at some point in order to keep itself directly facing the asteroid. But then again, it doesn't matter too much if it's facing the asteroid at an angle. So long as the construct doesn't smash crash into the rock, everything should be fine) Because of this particular movement protocol i predict that the platform would mine away the entirety of the asteroid from front to back,or top to bottom depending on the view point, like a person would remove bricks from a wall. One piece at a time. If this information interests you and you have a question for how it works, please ask. Also i suppose that if you managed to read through this long article i should reward you, i am a Quest giver after all, rewarding people for doing stuff is kinda my thing. So here it is: O]===[|[;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;> This is the lvl 48 unique chain-sword "Dead Void" Stats: 889-957 damage per sec + 40 to dexterity + 30% experience boost + 40 to intimidation factor + 300 to stamina + 100 to mana regeneration do you accept the reward? [Y/N] (All items are deposited directly to your inventory once accepted)

[@qualityshitposting9176]

Y

[@-Big_Big]

i think it was snagged by asteroid too. there is a way to make a rather complex timerblock setup that "if" no asteroid is present then (for instance : move backwards). or something even more simple - like turning on a antenna that says "No asteroid visible : Shipname" etc etc. which i would also love to see in the game that timerblocks can also read other properties of the ship such as Cargocontainer full :: (then you could use a antenna "Cargo Full" and also shut everything else off to prevent the miner from mining Damages components :: again shut everything off and flip antenna on saying "Need repairs" really awesome to see this - just a matter of tweaking sensors :3 - do keep it up

[@jimh8063]

I've found that a really good mod for better immersion or realism is the spotlight cone removal, because the cones right now aren't really optimized, and you can see that they aren't stopped by rocks or anything. 10/10 IGN

[@Falx415]

Space Termites...that's what these look like to me, in the way how they drill through the asteroid.

[@brianbrewster6532]

While I am intrigued somewhat of the concept of autonomous mining drones, one huge flaw in this concept is the fact that these don't approach the mining process with any uniformity. For instance, these are given so much largess they haphazardly mine in any direction they want versus align themselves in parallel directions for greater efficiency and to avoid colliding with one another. They should grid the asteroid with an end-to-end honeycomb and stay at least 2 cells apart so that the asteroid does not implode due to insufficient lattice support to sustain itself structurally. Understand? Other than that, Video Sage, you did a tremendous job with the mining drone design and are a truly a master space engineer!

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

And how would they go about doing that?

[@Dusto9]

Hey sage, a while ago i made a similar autominer and i have a few ideas that might help you: instead of giving up/down and left/right different lengths for the sensors at the back and front, give the gyro's different forces. This way you can have all directional sensors extend to max distance and it will still turn to one side if both sides are detecting since the force of one side overrules the other side. I then disabled steering once it was aligned with a forward facing sensor, and re-enable once exiting the asteroid. During the turn-around move i had a timerblock delay the sensor that stops the turning and starts drilling in a straight line. This way it would keep turning a little beyond when it detects the asteroid to prevent it from often drilling at the edge of the asteroid and more towards the center. Perhaps that can be of some help. It worked fairly well, except i occasionally ran into a bug that when turning on a previously disabled sensor while it was already within detection range of the asteroid, it would not trigger the actions it had set up even though the sensor did detect it. Which sometimes caused it to mess up on the initial start-up. That was annoying so i kinda didn't bother with it anymore and i had enough ore for a lifetime already haha. Thanks to you i want to have another go at it again though! :)

[@justingould2020]

Looking good so far. A couple of minor senor tuning and that would be an invaluable tool in survival.

[@danielmaerowitz5944]

Now make them self-replicating; welder and projector on the back=Von Neumann!

[@Blobjim]

Says the person with the HAL profile picture :P

[@patricpelto]

took me a couple of minutes to get what you meant ^^ but damn that would be awesome (as long they don't get self-aware).

[@Blobjim]

Patric Peltola :D

[@OakleyW23]

dont forget assemblers and refineries

[@ChrisPhelior]

Looking forward to the finished version of this. Hope you get well soon.

[@gremlinboi5578]

What u should do is make one turning sensor further back than the other turning sensors so there is always 1 dominate turning side

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

Replace Sensor with Thruster and you just might be onto something. I was thinking "Timer Block to Turn Off the other Sensors whilst it Drills".

[@LiarraSniffles_X3]

Oh god, I'm glad you got better at sensors.

[@Gassy1337]

Impressive and complicated as usual. Keep up the good work.

[@samsprague6923]

because when it turns for a second (thrid, fourth, ect..) attempt at mining, and the sensor field picks up the very tip of the asteroid when it stops the gyros from turning, make the sensor for turning go to a timer block, then the gyros, so that there is some time between seeing and stopping

[@shadowslayer552]

That was actually really cool man. Even for as finneky as it is it works great. Having to check in every once in a while isn't a big deal. Would be cool if there was a mod to project camera feeds onto a screen in your base or something.

[@BaranTheBad]

Dont give up on these it is a really cool idea.

[@connormaag3794]

Take the biggest asteroid you can find, spawn a whole bunch of these, and you have a high-tech space ant farm!

[@LB_]

For future reference, show what it does before you show how it works ;)

[@Tempestparagon]

could not agree less i like how sage shows how it works before he show's it working

[@LB_]

Jason Thompson --I don't understand your comment-- nevermind, it's easy to misread the way you worded it.

[@EctoSage]

Feedback noted, and I was actually thinking that when I was editing it, but didn't have the energy to re-record the whole thing. I will try to do so in the future, but no promises, old habits and all.

[@zobop]

Cool! Now put welders and a hologram at the back - with a bit of tweaking you might be able to make it self-replicating!

[@steve1978ger]

I love this old video because Sage basically re-invents cybernetics, i.e. robotics without digital computers, like it was done in scientific research until about 1980 or so. And guess what, they found that simple reactive patterns were easy enough to do, but combining them into more complex behaviours did require endless tweaking and was essentially impossible to get reliable. So science more or less gave up on those analogue sensor-actor links and started to put digital computers in their robots.

[@kathrynshacklford7050]

Please make a sabotage droid variant with grinders, as well as a freighter with hidden bays for deploying a swarm of sabotage drones in an enemy dockyard

[@thecobracdr6]

with the same setup remotely you could use this a way to have turrets on large ships auto track small/large ship targets. Just thought I would throw it out there sage.

[@mikeyunovapix7181]

now with the improved autopilot you can set waypoints for the drone to return and dock

[@maxsimpson501]

This is absolutely awesome!

[@joeymt9215]

i wonder how advanced this could become with the new programmable stuff and gps and jump drive, and all that.

[@Halo1172557]

You should make a maze using the thing where you spawn an asteroid over a station and then have to mine your way through the asteroid to find the middle of the station.

[@EctoSage]

Does sound like fun, shame a drill can also drill through the metal of the station if people are not cautious, or respectful of the rules. Still a very interesting idea I may look into.

[@MagesClub]

***** mods. I don't even need to explain

[@maxdestroyer1237]

***** liar

[@EariosRandomness]

Now to rig one up with bombs and send it at someone else's asteroid base. *chuckles evilly*

[@kalsaphixyasamon1507]

they stop when the inventory gets full. i made one myself, it has a few extras you dont seen to of thought of. my stream name is Kalsaphix, the name of my miner is the bunghole (very mature name)

[@Budrick3Gaming]

That is sick. Great job

[@hunterjuneau7037]

You continue to amaze!

[@MaximumJoy]

this is so cool. keep it up sage

[@tjl102]

could you connect 2or3 these (or something like them) to like a roter/chain system on a bigger mining/cargo ship so you can mine larger amounts from a command ship with atonomus mining hooks, i love the design

[@itsstico]

I like version 1 already. is going to be awesome when you get the bugs out!

[@derrmann328]

I noticed your lack of modded blocks, perhaps you too are vying for the Workshop additions?! Very sneaky!

[@SeedlingNL]

Should have called these Langoliers :D

[@lhcwresslar5033]

one thing i wish they would add is guns that you can set the angle to, so i currently use turrets

[@K162KingPin]

I built something similar before watching your video. I have a small ship design and a large ship design. Both set up with sensors to auto turn on the drills and thrusters to drive it through the asteroid. I don't know how to make them auto stop when the cargo is full or even better to auto finish digging out of the asteroid when the cargo is full and return to base. All I have figured out is how to make it auto dig and stop once its out the other side. Now thats pretty awesome but I'd like to know how to get it the rest of the way.

[@BurstFlare686]

Would be cool to find a completely autonomous mining drone to use in the atmosphere... like it only filled its cargo half way incase it has to dig itself out, then it could dock itself and not leave until it was fully charged etc. I would love to make one myself, but i to this day cannot make heads nor tails out of the SE programming on the programming block lol

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

It's in C# (C Sharp), there's a GitHub Code Repository set up somewhere.

[@eanna3781]

a programming block could make it so that when its full (or nearly full) it stops and heads back to base for unloading. Just a thought

[@StillhereFugookek]

13:41 your welcome

[@cyte112]

Video Sage This is my own Autonomous Mining Drone. It's a small-block ship, so it can be made pretty quick in survival, and it relies much more on timer programming than it does on sensors. This was the first thing I made with sensors and timers, and it worked like a charm. steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=356312362 Also, in my experience the "safe zone" made by large drills is the space directly behind them. Anything sticking out at all will be hit and possibly catch on stuff.

[@bennyuoppd33]

Might be saying silly things right now, but wouldn't adding more drills to the front make a bigger tunnel thus less chance of getting stuck?

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

And a Connector set to Collect All [On] to prevent the Drills from filling up too quickly.

[@NikoKun]

A few weeks back I built something like this.. Just far more simplified, only 1 turning sensor that detected when it left the asteroid, and then the whole thing just turned around and went back through. Kept having problems with it either crashing and breaking drills, or getting stuck for no reason at all, other than a game bug..lol

[@bostofte]

For the drill breaking, try to decreas the amount of thrust the backward firing thrusters pump out, it helped mine.

[@DanRam1710]

I had a snagging issue and when I set a gyro to roll the ship when it went through the asteroid it made it work better, snags were less frequent and only required it to be reversed slightly before powering back through. Also, could you make a build using the azimuth mod pack, the shields make for great protection for going through an asteroid. Hope this helps.

[@debemdeboas]

you are Space Engineers' Sethbling c:

[@OryxTheMadGod3]

Anyway we can use the remote control while the sensor issues are being fixed. :D

[@Greyguild]

Very nice only one question, how do you slow down the miner before it enter the asteroid, as well as inside it, after 2 or 3 entries it break it's drills

[@adaang4104]

perhaps IF and AND functions may help? if that is possible in space engineers

[@EmanuelMay]

It is possible, but not in a very straight-forward way. You have to really think outside the box and build ANDs yourself by using switches (Timer blocks) like transistors. I guess it's nothing that non-coders will get their heads around easily. Hopefully we will see basic boolean blocks soon.

[@MultiBlarblar]

RAWWWW!! You beat me to it I was just working on this exact idea.

[@Mic_Glow]

How about making it move sideways like a strip miner, it would continously mine the whole (or almost whole) asteroid instead of turning it into swiss cheese.

[@elizabethwesley7572]

Um, sage, why is there no blueprint or world link to that auto-mining drone? It seems pretty cool, but onemsugestion, have you ever wanted to knock out a ship? If so, try setting the drills/grinders to large/small ship and watch it go!

[@VideoSage]

Elizabeth Wesley Can't believe I forgot to put a link to the workshop. Added one now.

[@Rymaster095]

Have you considered using the same system with hacksaws? It wouke make a VERY deadly drone.....

[@Jayleon72]

Damn. you are good. Mother ship?

[@navanda4676]

Good work any way :D

[@ArcathWhitefall]

Couldn't you make some of the gyros stronger? So if it detects to conflicting directions one of them would pull stronger?

[@antoniot8367]

they stop inside because the inventory is full of stone...

[@juicyfruit5444]

amazing

[@TM-ui6wx]

why not make it a wall hugging drone that works more like an apple peeler?

[@drnekodr]

Is there a guide on how to set up the sensors for this type of drone?

[@CrashCraftLabs]

still its well done

[@ShawnIsAwesomeAtGaming]

if only you could make it auto-dock to a connector and unload...

[@thewanderingvoice7349]

I think you could with a programming block. Though, I might have an idea about how to automate the unloading without needing a programming block. I'll tinker with it, and if it works, I'll upload a video showcasing the out of game blueprints. I can't record gameplay on this hunk of junk.

[@prometheus8010]

2:45 uhhhhh more room for stuff?

[@JosephHead]

Will we be seeing Auto in season 3 and speaking of which when will we see the first episode of season 3

[@EctoSage]

No real ETA as of yet, but my personal plan is to hold it off till Exploration mode is ready to go.

[@iKentEven]

Can't wait! For both explore and season 3

[@anthonysbarrett]

Nice job, :-)

[@OryxTheMadGod3]

WAIT A MINUTE. DOES IT EVEN HAVE AN ORE DETECTOR?

[@personguy5302]

What could a gravity drive do with this ship?

[@ham_the_spam4423]

can you modify this thing so it can drill into an enemy asteroid base and cause a giant breach from under it?

[@navanda4676]

I have thinking abut to buy the SPE but i wonder how the MP is in the game

[@MarkTheSlayer987]

Can you make an auto aiming turrent for a small ship?

[@brycebolton1858]

Did you check if the cargo was full?

[@snowravenrp]

Video Sage how did you enable noclipping so you could fly through your ships like that? That would be mighty useful for creative mode.

[@needsanewname414]

It's spectator mode. Activate by pressing f7 (static) or f8 (movable)

[@needsanewname414]

But you have to enable it in the settings of the world

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

Configurable in [Esc Menu] > [Options] > [Controls] > I forget the last Menu Name off hand, but you Click the Dropdown Menu and pick the last option.

[@AmeOnDxm]

He said a band (One diretion) at 3:47

[@SoraBorg]

sage wants to overpower one direction

[@madman4367]

I took the design but I just made it longer and I ran into a problem it would explode for no reason.

[@DrunkNewbie]

Maybe it's just me but hwne i post the autominer to test it it just spins in circles..

[@MultiNillz]

fun and all but a tutorial on how you program the damn thing

[@ThatTinyDude]

what editing software do you use to be able to speed up the video this much?

[@TheBlazingStudios]

Any of them. A few examples: Adobe Premiere, Sony Vegas, Cyberlink Powerdirector. (The latter and final one being my personal favorite.)

[@ThatTinyDude]

been using vegas, render times are crazy long and it crashes a shit ton

[@EctoSage]

I use Adobe Premiere Pro, I select the section I want to speed up (I can of course cut it free if it's part of a longer video file using the C key to select the cut feature), right click it & select speed/duration, or something of that sort, then I just set the speed of that clip to whatever speed I want.

[@ThatTinyDude]

i think i found my new editing software, vegas only goes up to 4X

[@Lyndeno]

I use premiere elements which is a cheaper version of premiere. It lets me make things faster or slower with no limits(that I know of).

[@0ebk0]

when I turn off a drone. .how do I turn it back on

[@judas9909]

are u going to publish this to the workshop?

[@stanrock0]

gotta put wheels on it I put them on mine helps a whole lot

[@Eggburt1997]

You sound so much like David Schwimmer

[@reubenabc676]

call it the ant miner

[@KevinStr6]

Gravity gen to catch rocks

[@KevinStr6]

set to small area 5 meters from cutters

[@cyberstar251]

15:35 their like ants going about in an ant farm.

[@markus4595]

+zenol leytan Or maggots through a rotting corpse.

[@a2rgaming863]

Is boring into an asteroid make you boring or make you bored?

[@Dxpress_]

...What?

[@a2rgaming863]

Alonso Gonzalez You are getting close.

[@connormaag3794]

A little bit of both.

[@EctoSage]

The bore does the boring boring to insure you are not the one being bored.

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

Unless you run in front of it, I don't think the Safety Sensor detects Players, at which point that Boring Boreing has just made you very Bored, it'd be the most entertaining Boredom ever, especially if you weren't expecting it! (Eg. Drill through a Wall)

[@thelowmein9143]

Hello fellow engineers! I just came back to the game after a long hiatus (we have oxygen now lol). It saddens me that my PC which used to run this game so very beautifully now stutters and completely freezes for few moments every so often. I notice we now have unlimited asteroids and unlimited world sizes. I left all those settings to default, which includes unlimited asteroids low density, infinite world size, 256 objects, and 20 km view distance. Npc ships seem to spawn a lot more often as well. My PC is pretty beefy, 16 gb ram, quad core 3.5 ghz, gtx 680 gpu with 5gb. Is there anything i can do to make the game as pretty and smooth as it used to be? Or is this game just that hard to run now? Thanks!

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

Fewer Objects, anything over 64 can cause Lagg according to the Tooltip, default is now something like 53. You can Right Click an Option (like a Slider Bar) to reset it to Default.

[@angerymechanic661]

Turn your screen brighter i can barly make out the ship

[@AlexPadula]

How do i get it?

[@gsginsane]

this is a mod?

[@dogsteeves1]

Sage i know this is old but could I make it a Grinder ship

[@bits3608]

But it would target asteroids, and if it targets ships, a metallic massacre will happen, a self operating grinder ship is too dangerous

[@dogsteeves1]

Oh ok i was trying to grind a huge green ship

[@thewanderingvoice7349]

A self operating grinder ship..... *has fantasies of Space Engineers SKYNET* Hmmmmm. I might have to design a terminator drone and do a showcase video of the out of game blueprints.

[@BlueNEXUSGaming]

I play Modded MineCraft, when you say "too dangerous", I hear "a great idea" xD now I simply need to figure out how I'm going to go about getting it set up to fully automate the Mining, Smelting, Component Construction/Deconstruction, Power Generation, and of course the replication (Construction & Welding). Should be fairly possible, especially using Merge Blocks or Connectors (or both) with some Timers and perhaps one or two Programming Blocks (Battery Charge & Inventory Storage)

[@bitmylip5205]

i see the game is 50% off now, and i want to get it.

[@imanijones10]

Cool concept! Not very professional video tho.