Let's Keep It Simple

The technical pages for the project were relocated to GitHub wiki pages.

And What About Heavy Weather?

For a boat this small, almost any weather is heavy... What can we do to increase its chances of survival in a storm?

Avoid Bad Weather
If we can establish two way communication with the boat, we could change its course to get around troubles.

Storm Survival Mode
In a bad weather the boat could get into a survival mode, when it steers not towards the destination but to increase its chances of survival. Using data from accelerometer, gyroscope, GPS, and wind wane, the boat could compute a micro-model of the environment and choose the best survival strategy for the conditions.

Slow and Steady Wins The Race 
The boat should be build neither for speed, nor for comfort. We don't need large sail area. The autopilot will not get sea sick. The boat must be well built though. Automatic reefing is not realistic here, but we could make the sail to de-power at strong wind by building in a wist.

Any other ideas?

Transpac 2015

This year we missed Transpac 2015 race from Long Beach, California to Honolulu, Hawaii. Let's join the race (unofficially) the next year.

Taxis1 - The Pilot's Big Brother

Though a bit crazy, Taxis1 could chase light sources, avoid obstacles, and stand on two wheels. After the light sensor was replaced by MQ-3 gas sensor, the robot became addicted to alcohol and was subsequently disassembled :(.

Great Pacific Garbage Patch

That garbage patch is on our way! But we don't think this will be a problem because the size of the garbage particles is pretty small, so we will try to sail through it. We will have to think about getting  rid of sea weed and hopefully the first storm will release the boat if it gets trapped. We might also attach a knife to the keel so it will slice through garbage and seaweed.