Buoys on WII5 — Waves In Ice Buoys

Firmware

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The Firmware appears as 3 separate versions. AVR C++ code for origianal buoys and the latest, as we moved back to that for extra long battery life. A 32 bit embedded version for ARM, ESP32 versions, and a Linux Embedded version, originally written for Intel Edison. This page is talking about the first release of code based on AVR.

The AVR Control Code is a set of C++ code that is Arduino-compatible and works on multiple platforms including AVR and ESP32. Almost all the work — battery management, GPS, temperature, IMU, accelerometers, power control, Iridium / satellite control — is done here. This is the heart of the current release.

WII4 Sub-type A

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Placeholder for one of the WII4 variants. Photos, deployment notes, and any variant-specific differences from the main WII4 design go here.

WII5 Sub-type A

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Placeholder for one of the WII5 variants. Photos, deployment notes, and any variant-specific differences from the main WII5 design go here.

WII1 to WII3

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The first three WII generations were research prototypes — single-build or small-batch units that proved out the sensors, communications, and deployment patterns later productised in WII4 and WII5.

WII1 — the original 2012 AVR-based buoy. Modular firmware (ADC, GPS, IMU, SD, temperature) running on a custom MegaPro 3.3 V board.
WII2 — 2014 Scott Base build. Added the MPU9150 IMU, Kistler high-precision accelerometer, and Iridium SBD telemetry at 2–8 Hz.
WII3 — successor with the WatchDog AVR + Linux dashboard architecture, deployed at French Island, Port Phillip, and NIWA test sites through 2016–17.

Status: placeholder. Per-generation history, photos, and deployment notes to follow.

Electronics

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The main board contains most of the electrical hardware on the basic model.

Electronic schematics (PDF)
PCB schematics
Parts list and references
Build instructions
Photos of finished boards

Status: pending public release. Sanitised schematics and BOM to follow.

WII4 Sub-type B

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Placeholder for another WII4 variant.

WII5 Sub-type B

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Placeholder for another WII5 variant.

Buoy Types

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The WII project has gone through five major buoy generations. Earlier units were research prototypes; WII4 (Intel Edison-based) and WII5 (AVR/ESP32-based) have multiple production sub-types covering different deployment profiles.

WII1–WII3 — early research-prototype generations.
WII4 — Edison-era, with sub-types.
WII5 — current AVR/ESP32 generation, with sub-types.

Enclosures

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Enclosure designs for WII buoys, from the simplest ice-surface case through fully floating buoys built to survive Antarctic deployment. Choice of enclosure drives almost everything downstream — battery sizing, sensor mounting, what the antenna can see, and how the buoy behaves when the ice moves.

Design decisions

Ice survival

The enclosure has to live on or in sea ice for months. That means surviving freeze-in, freeze-thaw cycles, ice ridging, and the mechanical loads when floes collide. Critical points:

WII4

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The WII4 generation used the Intel Edison module as its main CPU, running Linux with a mix of C, shell, and Node code. Multiple sub-type variants were produced over its run.

Sub-type A — placeholder name; rename when the variant is identified.
Sub-type B — placeholder name; rename when the variant is identified.

Test Equipment

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The supporting equipment used to bring up, verify, and debug buoys — either on the bench or out in the field where there’s no internet.

Static Wave/Heave Tester

A bench rig that imposes a known vertical motion on a buoy so its accelerometer + maths pipeline can be calibrated and verified against a ground truth. Used to:

WII5

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The WII5 generation is the current production design: AVR/ESP32 main board running the C++ control firmware, with multiple sub-type variants for different deployment profiles.

Sub-type A — placeholder name; rename when the variant is identified.
Sub-type B — placeholder name; rename when the variant is identified.

Onboard Data Processing

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The on-buoy maths — Alison Kohout’s wave-motion algorithms running on the Maths CPU to reduce raw acceleration into a wave-statistics payload — is documented under Software → Onboard Data Processing.

This entry exists here so the Buoys sidebar has a pointer to it, because the processing runs on the buoy even though the code lives in the Software section.

Go to Software → Onboard Data Processing