Sander Bakker and Vester Knibbe ... 14:51, October 14 2008
Robosail retires 12:00, February 22 2008
Pieter safely on Azores 16:49, July 8 2005
Case closed 00:48, June 26 2005
Pieter's story 00:57, June 24 2005
RWYC retires Pieter? 22:10, June 22 2005
Pieter in good spirits 18:23, June 21 2005
RoboSail back on track! 18:34, June 13 2005
Robosail back in Plymouth with d... 12:09, June 9 2005
Lot's of people said farewell 15:47, May 15 2005
'OPEN DAG' Saturday May 14, 150... 11:21, May 4 2005
Pieter Adriaans and Henk de Veld... 17:42, December 19 2004
Robosail back in IJmuiden after ... 10:42, October 8 2004
Robosail prepares for voyage home 13:04, September 10 2004
RoboSail leaves for Azores 14:00, August 27 2004
Robosail in Falmouth 23:40, August 15 2004
Robosail trial runs with the new... 12:45, July 27 2004
Robosail Baptized 16:03, July 5 2004
Latest News - Kockengen 15:00, June 20 2004
The HISWA boat show 14:00, January 30 2004
Robosail back in Plymouth with damage to boomvang 2005-06-09 12:09:30 

Robosail returned to Queen Anne's Battery Marina last sunday. The main reasons for retiring from the race were problems with the hydraulic system of the boomvang and the loss of the radar system. Here is Pieter's report:

'I was only three days in the race when we got some bad weather. Nothing extra ordinary but unpleasant. The week before the start we had several storms with wind force 9 and there was a big swell. Three days after the start we sailed in to a depression and the a pattern of short waves was superimposed on the long swell, which lead to a very unpleasant sea. The boat was banging like I have never seen before. I could not cook any meals any more. Just to make a cup of coffee I had to hold the stove in one hand and the kettle in the other. Otherwise the lid of the kettle would bang against the ceiling. Suddenly I heard a loud hiss and the whole boat was filled with a mist of hydrolic oil. Quickly I checked what was wrong. At first my idea was that the system to position the boom in front of the mast had broken down, but it was the normal boomvang. I could not believe my eyes. There are thousands of ships sailing with these devices. The tube at the bottom of the mast had chafed through as the result of a simple reparation we had done this winter. This is very unfortunate because I abolutely need the boomvang to trim the sail. Without the boomvang the sail is not better then a flag on a telephone pole. I decided to sail on and try to do repairs when the wether was getting better. The problem was that because of a lack of power in the sail, the boat was even banging more than before. I was afraid that we would have structural damage to the hull. A couple of days later my radar came out of its pole at the stern. I was in radio contact with the designer and the builder several times. As soon as it became claer that there was no way to do the repair at sea. I decided to return.'  

At this moment we are in Plymouth working on repairs. We will decide on new plans for this season by the end of this week.