Colonizing - How To Get CMM Composites (Notes found on the internet)

 Sorry, I didn't keep links for many of these notes.  You'll have to search quotes from below to find most of them.  This was originally meant only as a help for me.  I wound up posting here so in case I'm not at my desk, I can still refer to these notes.
This may be easy for most of you, and seem pointless to be so thorough.  I've had cognitive problems ever since Covid in 2021, and it takes a lot of effort and study to learn things that used to be a lot easier.  This is just part of my process trying to retain things.

Note 001
Priority 1

For the “useless" T1 builds used to generate the T2 points, we recommend Orbital Communication Stations as they increase system security and provide a +3 tech boost while: being cheap, not needing surface slots, and have no economy type influence. Military orbital outposts are another security option, and also provide a small population boost, but are three times the material costs of Comm Stations.

Note 002

Priority 1

From Cmdr Mechan’s MEGA GUIDE:

Case Study #2: Producing CMM Composites

A lot of players have been asking about how to produce CMM Composites, which are a commodity required in high volumes for the construction of larger ports.

Producing CMM composites is surprisingly simple - noting one needs to appreciate that CMM Composites (much like Ceramic Composites) are produced only at planetary ports with a refinery economy.

Also note that while NPC ports further have the requirement of having to be based on High Metal Content worlds, such restriction does NOT apply to player-built ports. A player can theoretically produce CMMs on most colonizable planet types (noting that attempting to do so on icy planets would prove extremely challenging, if not outright impossible.)

The easiest way to produce CMM Composites is the following:

Identify and claim a system with at least one “clean” rocky planet (no rings, no biologicals, no geologicals) which has at least one planetary construction slot

Build a Primary Port that won’t interfere with a refinery economy (i.e., make sure you don’t convert it to a supporting facility later on.)

Build a Tier 1 Civilian [Planetary] Outpost on your rocky body

That’s it! The Tier 1 Civilian [Planetary] Outpost will pick up a Refinery economy from the Rocky local body, and will be producing CMMs without the need for any supporting infrastructure.

Note that because such a system will have a pretty small population and pretty low economy strength and system statistics, production volume for CMMs will be somewhat low to start.

If you have additional time and the planet has additional planetary slots available, you can also build two Refinery Hubs to boost CMM Composites production if you want - and any other facilities that boost system population (without introducing competing economies) will also help boost production volumes.

This example is shown in the “Colony 4” tab of the demo spreadsheet (same as above.)

Note 003
https://elite-dangerous.fandom.com/wiki/System_Colonisation

How To Get CMM Composite

If you want your system to generate CMM Composite, you'll need to set up one of the following:

Rocky body. This gives a base economy of Refinery + 1.0.
Building a Surface - Planetary Port - Outpost Civilian, or Surface - Planetary Port – Port, will produce CMM Composite.
There's a bonus if the system's reserves level is Major or Pristine, and a penalty for Low or Depleted reserves.
If the body has geological signals, biological signals, or terraforming, you may need to add Refinery Hubs on the surface to get the Refinery strength high enough to be one of the top two Economies.

High Metal Content body. This gives a base economy of Extraction + 1.0. You will need to build one of the Planetary Ports with Colony economy (Outpost Civilian or Port) and then build one or more Refinery Hubs.
If the body has geological signals, biological signals, or terraforming, you may need to add Refinery Hubs on the surface to get the Refinery strength high enough to be one of the top two Economies.

As long as the Refinery Economy stays in one of the top two spots of the market, you can build whatever else you want in the system (or even on that body).

For a long discussion on this, see this post in the forums, but this is from before the August 21, 2025 update: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/requirements-to-produce-cmm-composites.637152/

Note 004

...and must be built on rocky/hmc not icy/rocky icy otherwise the surface port will turn into industrial & eat up all the CMM

Also make sure that the planet does not have volcanic activity, which will induce an arbitrarily strong industrial influence destroying the refinery imports as well. This is the case for my current refinery where the HMC's volcanic activity has nuked all the exports relevant to colonizing except (somehow) steel and titanium. (And I'm really not coming to heads with why "volcanic activity = industrial"... get the extraction part but not the other)

Step 1) Find and claim a system with a HMCW
Step 2) Build a surface civilian port
Step 3) Build 2x a refinery

Check your market = It will have CMM, Ceramic, Liq o2, Steel, Titanium, etc

NOTE 005
Priority 1

Summarizing everything I found in this thread, for the ultimate refinery system:

• Find and claim a system with a Rocky (best) or High Metal Content World (HMCW). Rocky gives extra points of Refinery which will help resist weak links later.

• The Primary Build should be a civilian or commercial outpost port. Doesn't matter where.

• On the target world build a surface civilian port. Build 2x a refinery.

• Must be built on rocky/hmc not icy/rocky icy otherwise the surface port will turn into industrial & eat up all the CMM.
  (You want Rocky, not HMC, ideally. HMC isn't terrible (because Extraction doesn't interfere much) but Rocky actually gives you extra points of Refinery which will help resist weak links later.)

• Planet should have Major or Pristine resources.

• Make sure that the planet does not have volcanic activity, which will induce an arbitrarily strong industrial influence destroying the refinery imports as well.

• Planet Geo gives bonus. The type of Geologicals doesn't matter. This not correct for Refinery. Stay away from planets with geo.

• CMM will only be available from ground bases.

• Orbital above HMCW + refineries = Steel and Titanium but no CMM's

• Note that CMM composites are consumed by High Tech, Industrial, and Military economies.

• If you have ANY industrial settlements or outpost in the system whatsoever, the new economy calculation will cause your refinery's economy to be massively overtaken by an industrial demand. A single tiny industrial settlement somewhere in the system will cause all ceramic composites and semiconductors to disappear from your surface refinery's market. Even when it's a large T3 surface refinery.

It sounds like a dedicated system is ideal.

Facilities anywhere in the system that negatively impact refinery are:
- Industrial, high tech, military, terraforming.

Facilities that don't negatively impact refinery (for most cmdr purposes) are:
- Extraction, agriculture, tourism.

NOTE 006
(Odd direction, but interesting throughts. #5 is useful whatever your goals are.)

You can probably get by with just one system, I think, if it's got a few rocky moons and a decent number of other bodies with multiple orbital slots. It'll just look a bit odd as to which components of it do what.

1) Rocky moons get built up as refineries with colony-type ports and lots of hubs. These are where your T3s go, if you want any of those. Repeat on as many rocky moons as possible to get the refinery hubs cross-supporting each other's markets with weak links too.

2) T1 intrinsic economy ports don't generate weak links, or pick up planetary influence, so you can put them in orbit around other bodies safely for your HT and Industrial needs

3) If you put two T1 ports around the same planet, the weak links from your refineries will only stick to exactly one of them (the older one), so you can get single-type economies here by building a decoy [1]. Since you're not building it for exports anyway, Military T1 outpost built first as the decoy, then Industrial/HT as the economy should be a good combination. You can do the same on the surface with the intrinsic T1 surface outposts.

4) If you have ring systems with two slots you can do the same to get an Extraction economy: build a Coriolis first as the decoy, then an Asteroid base for the economy

5) Comms, Satellite and Government installations can be safe ways to fill extra slots as they don't have an economy type so don't generate weak links

6) Then you're only missing Agricultural, and you have enough stations protected from weak links by decoys that you can afford to just build a bunch of Odyssey agri settlements elsewhere in the system, because you'll only lose biowaste exports on the refineries and the decoys, but not the whole system, and hope between them that they either produce what you want or you get it via weak links somewhere.

Re - [1] You also have the option to build a higher-tier port as the decoy, and then build order doesn't matter, so you could stick a Coriolis or Orbis out here (for shipyard, outfitting and general population/stats boosts) to shield the outpost from weak links.

NOTE 006.1
(Goes along with points in NOTE 006)
So if I read this thread correctly any buildings except ports, satellites, comm stations and government installations should be avoided like the plague, to not get weak links ruining a system economy.

You can go a bit further than that:
- things which generate weak links of the economic type you already want are fine
- ports which have a decoy port built in the same location to attract the weak links are fine (though this also attracts strong links, so only works for shielding planet or intrinsic economies)
- if you know what you're doing, there may be a "safe" level and/or type of weak links, though that's a lot trickier and very specific to what you want the economy for

NOTE 006.2
(Also goes along with #5 from NOTE 006)
Love that catch 22. The only way to have a secure system is to have Military, but the only way to have CMM is not to have Military. I guess that, technically, one could build 20 Orbital Military Outposts, but that's 360,000 tons just to get 40 security. It'd also be nice if FDev could give some info on how detrimental those weak links can be. E.g., if I have Refinery of 1.4, can that withstand 0.25 of Weak Military and still produce enough CMM? or only 0.1 of Weak Military?

You can get Security increased without going the military route, but will require more effort. Communication Station will give you +1 Security (and a T2 point), and a T2 Government Installation will give you +2 Security (and a T3 point), both of these do not give any system economic influence whatsoever.

NOTE 007
(This just confirms my thoughts to build mainly Refinery in the system.)

I have a system with 3x HMCW's next each other.

Build on the first planet a surface outpost port, build 2x refinery hubs.
Once the 2nd was build, the market of the port became active with CMM, Steel etc etc.
Now with new update that port have two strong links.

On the 2nd HMCW I did the same.
Now with the new update that port on the first and 2nd HMCW have two strong links and two weak links.

Atm busy with building a big civilian port on the 3rd HMCW
Normally I guess, it would have 4 weak links, once I have build on that 3rd planet 2x refinery hubs it will have 2 strong links and 4 weak links

I'm curious how the market will look like.

Surely there comes a point where the additional amount of commodities becomes redundant. 200k steel etc at a single T2/T3 should be enough for future construction?

Yes, at the moment max Steel stock in one of my surface port is +-138k
4 or more cmdr's were hauling steel and lowest was 95k
Each 10min the market regenerate some materials, so after an hour or bit more the max stock is back

NOTE 008

I thought that CMMs are only produced on HMCs- was that debunked a while back or changed with recent Colonization updates?

Never true even in the original. Any surface refinery can produce CMMs.

HMCs in general are Extraction which won't harm CMM production in the new version, but won't help it either - Rocky is much better.

Rocky or HMC, oodles of CMMs are produced, well beyond needs.

NOTE 009

From someone who disagrees:
This is what I have:
Main Rocky body - Tier 2 Coriolis
1 Refinery Hub, 1 Military Settlement, 1 Extraction Settlement on main body.
- Strong Links to the tier 2. (This is the only body with more than 1 ground slot.
The rest only have 1 ground slot)
1 Refinery hub on Rocky Body 2 - weak link
Tier1 Ground Outpost (Colony) on Rocky Body 3 - Makes CMMs, Polymers, Semiconductors, Superconductors, Ceramic Composites (see attach screenshot).
Other weak link orbitals and installations around other bodies. Mostly extraction or agriculture.

These don't impact the refinery economy for what I want. That's important. It may effect a good(s), but its not the ones I care about.

And the reply:
... Actually, you just need a rocky body with no biologicals or geologicals. That's what you've put your colony on, and that's where 140% of your refinery economy is coming from. If you'd picked anything else (a metal rich, HMC, or icy body) it would not have worked.

NOTE 010

Here is what I did:
T1 civilian ground port
followed by 1 refinery hub
I built this on a HMC world with no rings.
I have a decent population in this system, so it produces enough CMMs to build a T3.
There is a weak link in the system to a T2 starport that has a refinery economy, but I don't think that played much role in getting CMM and Ceramics.

From Gemini: (Suspect information, don’t accept at face value)

1. Best Planet Selection

You need a planet that can support a settlement with the prerequisites for a Refinery economy. The most suitable candidate from your system details is COL 285 Sector AX-J C9-9 3.

• Planet: COL 285 Sector AX-J C9-9 3

• Planet Type: High Metal Content

• Surface: Landable

• Rationale: High Metal Content planets have the raw materials required to start a Refinery economy, and being landable is mandatory for a surface settlement.

2. CMM Composite Production Build Order

CMM Composites are a Tier 2 manufactured good, so they require a simple two-step chain: Refinery -> Manufactory.

Step	Unit to Build	Location	Economy Established	Notes
1	Refinery (Tier 1)	Planetary Surface (on Planet 3)	Refinery	This T1 unit processes raw ores and establishes the required economy type. It consumes basic resources like Iron, Nickel, and Sulphur (which are present on High Metal Content worlds).
2	Manufactory (Tier 2)	Planetary Surface (on Planet 3)	Refinery	This T2 unit consumes the output of the Refinery (Minerals) and produces the desired CMM Composites. It will also produce other T2 manufactured goods.

Export to Sheets

Final Output: CMM Composites