An adventurer has begun his expedition to live alone on the remote Atlantic islet of Rockall for 60 days.

Nick Hancock, a chartered surveyor from Ratho, near Edinburgh, plans to arrive at the tiny port of Leverburgh on South Harris in the Outer Hebrides, after driving from Edinburgh with nearly half a tonne of equipment for his two-month expedition.

Weather permitting, he is hoping to start the 230-mile voyage to Rockall from Leverburgh later this week.

It is nearly four years since Hancock first began to research an expedition to the tiny volcanic outcrop described by some geographers as the most isolated oceanic rock in the world. It has taken him three years of detailed planning.

"There's a sense of relief that I'm actually on the move," Hancock said. "We're progressing in the right direction instead of just worrying about the organisation. I'm just trying to relax after all the hecticness and the rush to get things ready."

But elation was tempered by leaving his 18-month-old son, Freddy, and wife, Pam, at home, he added. "It's quite hard because every mile we're driving towards the starting line is a mile away from the family."

A marathon runner and climber, Hancock hopes to beat two longstanding occupation records. The first was set in 1985 by the adventurer and yachtsman Tom McClean, an SAS veteran who occupied Rockall for 40 days to support the UK's territorial claim to the islet. And in 1997, three environment campaigners from Greenpeace occupied Rockall for 42 days and renamed it Waveland in protest at the race to find and exploit new oil and gas reserves in the surrounding seabed.

Hancock has built his own 150kg (330lb) survival pod, nicknamed the Rockpod, from a plastic water bowser, and is taking a satellite phone, laptop and digital camera powered by a wind turbine and a solar panel. The pod, which will hold all his supplies, will be bolted to the only occupiable area of Rockall: a 3.5-metre by 1.3-metre wide flat area near Rockall's summit known as Hall's Ledge; the islet itself is just 25 metres across and 18 metres high.

He could face sudden storms lashing the Atlantic into with five-metre waves and winds hitting 40 knots (46mph). The nearest land is the largely uninhabited island group of St Kilda, occupied by a British military outpost, 186 miles to the east.

Hancock said his main motivation was personal: to challenge himself with a feat of mental and potentially physical endurance. He also plans to raise money for Help for Heroes.

Hancock will be blogging regularly on his Rockall Solo expedition for the Guardian, with video blogs and diary updates. The Guardian has made a donation towards the expedition.