Drill
| Drill | |
|---|---|
| |
| Function: | Ship drills are utility tools for mining ores on planets or asteroids |
| DLC? | Vanilla |
| Fits small grid | |
| Mass: | 1004.2 kg |
| Hitpoints: | 4381 |
| PCU: | 190 |
| Size: | 3x3x6 |
| Time to Build: | 20 sec |
| Fits large grid | |
| Mass: | 6741.0 kg |
| Hitpoints: | 32125 |
| PCU: | 190 |
| Size: | 1x1x3 |
| Time to Build: | 30 sec |
| Data Controls: | [purge] (?)) |
The 
Drill is a block tool block in Space Engineers. Players use block drills in Survival Mode as an industrial miner, either to gather ores and ice, or to remove layers of stone (also know as voxel material), instead of using the smaller Hand Drill.
For other ways of removing voxels, see also Voxel Hands.
Usage
Using the block drill is similar to how you use a Hand Drill. Block drills produce a hole about three small blocks in diameter and one or two blocks deep, depending on how far the Drill is from the surface.
How to switch between digging and mining
- Open the Drill's control panel and
- Press G key to open the Toolbar Config menu
- Drag the drill from the "Block" (!) section to your toolbar and select the Terrain Clearing Mode on/off option.
- Drag the drill from the "Block" (!) section to your toolbar and select e.g. the block on/off option.
- Press ESC key to close the window.
Activate the first toolbar slot to toggle the terrain clearing mode on to dig, or off to mine ores. Then use the second toolbar slot to toggle the drill on and off.
How to dig (manual control)
Same as hand drills, block drills have a secondary tool mode (
) that simply clears out stone and deletes the chunks (and deletes ores, careful!).
- Press G key to open the Toolbar Config menu
- Drag the drill from the "Block Tools" (!) section to your toolbar.
- Press ESC key to close the window.
- Activate the toolbar slot.
-click to clear voxels.- Double--click to toggle auto digging on/off.
Deleting voxels is useful for getting past the soil layer of a planet, or the outer "shell" of an asteroid quickly to get to the more valuable stone and ore below, without having to mine out and collect lots of comparatively less dense soil.
How to mine (manual control)
Block drills have a primary mode that mines stone and ores and, unlike the hand drill, sucks them into the conveyor system.
- Press G key to open the Toolbar Config menu
- Drag the drill from the Block Tools (!) section to your toolbar.
- Press ESC key to close the window.
- Activate the tool bar slot.
-click to activate the ship drill to collect ores- Double--click to toggle auto mining on/off.
How to dig out a wreck
If you want to dig out an NPC encounter wreck, you often have the problem that drills destroy blocks. A drill will damage grids but will not destroy the grid it is built on.
So instead of drilling the ground from the outside:
- Build the drill, a seat, and a power source on the wreck!
- Sit in the seat and hold to clear out the stone surrounding the wreck.
- Then grind off and rebuild the drill to reach more areas, repeat.
Power
A single Drill uses 2 kW of power while it is running. It does not matter if it is in contact with stone or not.
Inventory
The block drills have a built-in inventory with a capacity of 3,375L on small ships and 23,437.5L on large ships and stations. This inventory will only accept ore type items. Drills will send push requests for all of their contents through Conveyor systems.[1]
Gallery
A typical asteroid mining ship with drills
Drill radius diagram (by Consty)
A small planetary mining ship with two drills
Construction
The drill can be built on large ships, small ships, and stations.
The small ships' drill is 3x3x6 small-grid cubes big, while the on large ships it is 1x1x3 large-grid blocks (meaning, they are the same size). Minimising the gap between the drills is important: two small drills can be separated by a single small-grid block without problem, but with the large drill, any gap is enough to allow stray voxel material to get between the drills, preventing them from boring deeper — or even damaging them.
Recipe
| Drill | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Component | Large Ship/Station Required | Large Ship/Station Optional | Small Ship Required | Small Ship Optional |
 Computer | 5 | — | 1 | — |
 Motor | 5 | — | 1 | — |
 Large Steel Tube | 12 | — | 4 | — |
 Small Steel Tube | — | — | 8 | — |
 Construction Comp. | 40 | — | 8 | — |
 Steel Plate | 180 | 120 | 20 | 12 |
