Tenth time lucky - Finally !! - a Successful Ocean Passage

Sunday 7th September 2025 around 6pm Voyager 2.9 was launched from Torquay.

She was bound for Flinders in Western Port, around 50 miles or 80kms to the east.

Winds were generally 10 to 15knots, peaking at 20knots from the northwest and backing around to southwest over the next two days.

Launch from Torquay Fisherman's Beach 6pm Sunday.

Course from Torquay, 80km eastward to Western Port

The intended destination was Flinders beach, just inside Western Port. This beach is calm, and surrounded by hills. The hills tend to block the southwesterly wind. As the boat cleared the last waypoints to head into Flinders, there was not enough wind power to overcome the incoming tide.

This meant that Voyager was swept out of its corridor and deeper in Western Port.

I could see from the satellite tracking that it was not going to be able to reach Flinders. I was able to move to high ground and gain line-of-site to establish a telemetry link and redirect Voyager further north to Point Leo, where a landing would be easier, with more favourable winds.  

The telemetry uses 433MHz LoRa. It is reasonably reliable over 2 to 3km provided there is line-of-site. This requires being elevated above the beach, on the hills behind.

Approaching the beach at Point Leo, Tuesday midday, 100m to go.

Happy skipper.

I swam out 50m to bring Voyager to shore.

Safely ashore at Point Leo after 44 hours

Battery Life

The main battery consists of 12 x 18650 cells arranged as 2S x 6P.

When the nominated minimum voltage is set at 6.5Vdc, the estimated battery life is around 10 days.

The Wing Sail battery consists of a pair of 18650 cells arranged as 2P.

With a nominal minimum voltage of 3.5Vdc, the estimated battery life is around 60 days.

Wrap up

The boat was in good order on arrival, responding well to manual override via the LoRa telemetry channel. It appeared that it could have continued at sea for several more days.

Summary of failures on previous ocean voyages:

1. Fatigue failure of aluminium mast, and loss of equipment housing due to inadequate strength and fastenings. Changed to carbon fibre mast, and greatly improved the strength of hull fastenings.
2. Water ingress into the Wing Angle Sensor, which is 3D-printed part. Filled the sensor housing with epoxy resin so that we don't rely on the 3D-print being waterproof.
3. Software errors related to weather changes and wind direction transitions in particular cases that were not correctly handled. Some software errors are not revealed with lake testing on short courses. Some are only revealed on multi-day multi-mile courses with wind direction transition that were not anticipated.
4. Poor compass calibration, combined with software errors lead to failure. This was addressed by focusing on improving compass performance and calibration, and also software improvements to make better decisions and be more resilient in the cases where compass accuracy is critical.
5. Failure of standard servo with a brushed motor. Changed to brushless servo motors for steering. There may still be an issue with the life-span of the mechanical potentiometer used for positional feedback. On low-cost servos, the feedback potentiometer may wear out. So this is still an issue of concern.
6. Failure of the Wing Sail controller due to water damage. This is now potted in epoxy and has performed well over multiple missions at sea. This includes the failed 6th voyage, lying on a beach for 100 days. It worked perfectly after that, once powered up, so the one controller has been reused on all voyages since.
7. Likely failure of the Wing Sail structure. It is difficult to prove, but it is believed that one or two failed missions may have been caused by the Wing Sail suffering a structural failure with the tail.
   A new design has now been established for the Wing Sail that eliminates the separate tail with trim tab and integrates the trim tab into the main foil. This design appears to be inherently stronger because of the elimination of the separate tail.