Hybrid Thoughts

Funny to think of a sail boat in the same manner as software. But this is true for the 420. The control board can be reprogrammed when new versions of the control software have been developed. That means we can benefit from refinements and lessons learned over time. Dignity received a software upgrade in August from the Lagoon folks who visited the islands in the latter half of the month. Not sure yet what benefits the upgrade brought yet but hopefully I’ll learn in time. In listening to reports from later owners of Lagoon 420s there have been improvements in handling under power. My guess is we’ve simply been brought in line with the later vessels. The whole system is modular too which was one of the early attractions. The automotive industry is heavily sponsoring the development of batteries suitable for meeting customer needs for hybrid cars. It seems that it won’t be too long before some form of lithium ion replacements will be available at a decent cost. The 420 system is ready to accept this new technology when it arrives. With the significantly increased density of usable power in the next generation of battery we will be able to choose between some combination of increased electrical storage AND reduction in weight. Looking forward to that. Back to more recently. We’ve also had improvements made to the ventilation around the electric motors. This will improve the operating envelope as the system is designed to reduce power to the motors if they overheat (a very useful feature). This improvement will certainly help in charter where users may not have time to acquaint themselves with the limits of the previous system. Again, I believe this is a simple matter of bringing Dignity in line with later boats off the assembly line. At this point we’re now down to 155 days till we get to see Dignity ourselves. Seems a very long time.