For my 2cents worth I figure the 'mining' laser would also be used in the prospecting phase of things as it melts/vaporizes a portion of the material and would allow for spectral analysis.
While many asteroids will be nickle-iron, chondrites (sp?), or even more akin to the iceballs that are thought to be the primary form of comets (iceballs-plus?) those are not the only kinds. The metorite that caused the air-burst explosion in Siberia left traces of iridium IIRC and it is supposed to be a large metorite that is the source of the USSR's supply of titanium. They certainly have an abundance of the metal that others do not considering that they were able to build a number of submarines using it for the hulls (Akula class I believe). So while the iron-nickels, stoney, and ice-balls may predominate they shouldn't be the only ones.
Consideration could also be given as to how the asteroids in a particular system were created... are they 'left overs' from the creation of teh planets in the system? Are they the remnants of a planet that was destroyed? (was the planet ripped apart by a couple of jovian class planets getting to close or some super eco disaster or war by an earlier race?) When novas and supernovas go off the planets of nearby systems must take a pounding, what was the original class of the planet (sub-jovian, jovian, terran, venutian?) what is left after the nova radiation and blast front passed through? (asteroids, barren airless, tainted thin, what else may have occurred?
Since traveller essentially is hand-wavium in any number of essential respects one need not hold too tightly to any specifics but apply ones imagination ... what would happen to an essentially iron-nickel asteroid that got caught 'to close' to such a stellar event? Would it be compressed in some manner? What other products are out there? IMTU I took the idea of collapsium (steel that was compressed using all sorts of hand-wavium grav fields and spread the idea to a few other metals including titanium ... these were rolled for on a percentile die and if something in the really rare column another roll was made to see if it was something like this ...
iron-nickel asteroids of sufficient size could be worth quite a bit in and off their own right, at least they were out of some planets gravity well and therefore somewhat easier to haul to a space based refinery/manufacturing center.
________________________________
From: Roger Malmstein
Sent: Sat, December 5, 2009 1:50:47 PM
Subject: Re: [Traveller_TNE] Mining
Belters has never been given much attention in Traveller
other than in Beltstrike and maybe in the adventure "Expedition into
Zhodane"
The only function I see for a mining laser is to cut
asteroids or large rocks into smaller ones that are gobled up by ships/robots of
different sized and crushed to smaller pieces before large ovens melts the ore
out of the collected rocks.
Lasers simply replaces the need for use of explosives to
break chunks of rocks apart. No one in their right mind would blow a rock into
pieces. It will send shrapnel all over the place, and it my damage both crew and
equipment. On a planetary surface this is of minot concern as gravity and air
resistance will make sure that shrapnel from blasts doesn't fly too
far.
With this in mind I suspect a mining laser will have way
different properties than a weapon grade laser. Much like a over sized surgical
laser. Instead of steady pulses it sends a continous beam that burns through the
rock. The effect is also relatively low compared to weapon grade lasers. neither
gravitic focusing or a-ray technology is required as ranges are usually just a
few hundred meters at most.
I expect a focal array for a continious laser beam
is will have different properties than a weapon grade
laser. Effect may be limited to just a few
MJ.
Finding ore would probably be done with a wide variety
of sensor scans. Both to find asteroid density and mass. Knowing these things
will help determine if there might be anything valuable inside. Deeper scans
with earth penetrating radar or just landing and do seismic tests may reveal
other properties. And lastly chemical and spectroanalysis. This can be done by
using the mining laser.
--
Roger Malmstein
www.travellerfreepo rt.com