Going for the speed achievements. I had the great idea that fewer asteroids meant I could race to planets and Solar System Edge with lighter ships.
…turns out it also applies to asteroid chunks. My ships needed a full hour to refuel, and space science took several hours to get the research for getting to Vulcanus.
RESTART
Another strategy you could do to mitigate that is have a blueprint of your ship with huge extended arms, keep a cargo bay’s worth of the materials, and whenever you stop, slap that blueprint on.
Collect materials like a stationary satellite build, and then deconstruct the arms, and pack them away.
Wish this could be a fully automated thing, but its livable for a speedrun situation.
You could even store asteroids in permanent belts on your real ship, so the processing can keep going mid-flight.
Well, I know what I am messing around with tonight.
There is a viable strategy with it, but it requires a specific infrastructure from the start: Build a huge science platform with 40 grabbers to get going, and ship water up via launches. After Vulcanus for carbon, all fuel can be shipped up.