How to Build an Early Mining Rig

What a mining rig does

A mining rig is a vehicle that automatically drills into an ore vein, collects the drops and returns to base. Once built, you can set it loose on a vein and come back later with a full inventory of refined metal. The rig is the cornerstone of the underground mining endgame.

What you need

• 1x Driver Seat
• 1x Battery
• 4x Big Wheels (with bearings)
• 1x Gas Engine
• 1x Drill array (Plasma Drill or basic Drill)
• 1x Conveyor belt
• 1x Storage chest
• 1x GPS receiver (optional, for autopilot)

Total: about 100 refined metal and 50 components. Most players reach this by hour 4 of their first run.

The build sequence

1. Build the chassis: 6 metal blocks in a 3x2 pattern.
2. Mount the Driver Seat on the front block and the Battery directly behind.
3. Add bearings at each corner and attach Big Wheels to them.
4. Mount the Gas Engine on the back of the chassis. Wire it to the Battery via a controller.
5. Attach the Drill array in front of the chassis, slightly below the Driver Seat.
6. Place a Conveyor belt from the Drill to the Storage chest.
7. (Optional) Add the GPS receiver and wire it to the steering bearings for autopilot.

This takes about 30 minutes once you know the steps. The community has shared ready-made blueprints on the official Discord.

How to use the rig

1. Drive the rig to an ore vein.
2. Face the vein and press the drill activation button.
3. The drill carves through the vein. Ore drops fall onto the conveyor.
4. The conveyor moves the ore to the chest automatically.
5. When the chest is full, drive back to base and unload.

For autopilot, set a GPS waypoint at the vein and another at base. The rig drives itself, drills the vein, and returns when the chest is full. This is the basis of every automated mining operation in the 1.0 chapter.

Common mining rig mistakes

• Using too many wheels. Four Big Wheels with bearings is the sweet spot.
• Forgetting the Battery. The drill is power-hungry and the rig will stall.
• Placing the Drill too high. It must contact the ore vein directly.
• Skipping the GPS. Without it, you have to manually pilot the rig every time.

Where to take the rig next

Once you have one rig, the next step is to chain multiple rigs to a central Ore Crusher. The community pattern is:

1. Build a Refinery Bot at base.
2. Add a Conveyor belt from the base chest to the Refinery Bot.
3. Wire a motion sensor on the chest to the Refinery Bot.
4. The Refinery Bot automatically processes incoming ore.

This is the same pattern the controllers and sensors guide uses for automated farms. The 1.0 patch’s frozen-bearing system keeps even large factory chains running smoothly.

Upgrades for late game

Once you have the early rig, upgrade to:

• A Plasma Drill array for faster mining.
• A larger Storage chest for longer autonomous runs.
• A second rig for parallel mining.

For the underground endgame, see the underground mining guide.