My players have found the base, but I've made it clear to them that it isn't going to be anything even close to a turn-key operation to get it up and running. They've opined that it may not even be worth the investment. A few details off the top of my head, as my notes are currently elsewgere:
The base is located in the "Scatter", the chaotic system of moonlets and debris orbiting Hanby. The belters of the Scatter have long valued their privacy and have resisted efforts to map the Scatter [see Mongoose's "Borderlands Profile: Wildeman" for more details--it is a steal at $3]. So, while it is well concealed, it would behoove our pirates to come to some kind of arrangements with the neighbors if they ever plan to run more than the occasional bit of traffic in there (more along these lines below).
The place has been abandoned for over a century...and the survivors of Dour's crew effectively stripped it before that. It'll take a lot of work to be made functional again. In fact, it'll take a lot of work just to evaluate what kind of work needs to be done. If you've got a copy of "Beltstrike" you can mine the section on the mining platform for ideas (pun sort of intended). This evaluation requires extended checks of skills that a pirate crew is unlikely to have...but the belters in the neighborhood, do. The base is a converted ore depot, after all. Maybe the crew can come to some kind of agreement...
I broke the base, and the work required to restore, it into a number of subsystems: power, life support, fuel processing, hanger/shipyard operations. Each of these can be restored to varying levels of functionality, some of which interlock with one another. For example, getting basic life support (light, air, and gravity) working is a fairly simple task. Once accomplished, the basic has a monthly life support requirement comparable to a largish starship. Additional work can be done which brings the hydroponics bays online. This would reduce the monthly life support requirement, as the base can supply some of its own food. Full life support resoration is an even greater investment, but once realized reduces the monthly cost to near zero, as the hyoponics can supply all the food and purify the air (eliminating the need to replace chemical scrubbers and the like) and even possibly produce a surplus of 2-12 dtons of Basic Consumables each month (which can easily be traded to the local belters). This upper level of functionality, however, requires that the crew get the power plants restored to well above basic functionality, and get the fuel processing going (both to supply the full output power systems with a steady supply of metal hydride fuel and to use the CHON byproducts as plant nutrients).
Each "level" of functionality for each system requires an increasing amount of investment, both in money and skill, and they way I have it set up, it will never be anywhere near as efficient as a "real" starport. The shipyard, for example, is the first thing players will salivate over. While full investment will enable cheap (and discreet) repairs, actually building a ship would cost more than buying one, as it is merely an "assembly plant"; subcomponents still have to be purchased and shipped in.
But as a place to hide out, repair damage, warehouse loot, and conduct raucous councils with the other captains in their cutthroat fleet, the place can be pretty freaking awesome.
