An impact-based broadband aeroelastic energy harvester for concurrent wind and base vibration energy harvesting

This paper proposes a novel broadband energy harvester to concurrently harvest energy from base vibrations and wind flows by utilizing a mechanical stopper. A problem for a conventional wind energy harvester is that it can only effectively harness energy from two types of excitations around its resonance frequency. The proposed design consists of a D-shape-sectioned bluff body attached to a piezoelectric cantilever, and a mechanical stopper fixed at the bottom of the cantilever which introduces piecewise linearity through its impact with the bluff body. The quasi-periodic oscillations are converted to periodic vibration due to the introduction of the mechanical stopper, which forces the two excitation frequencies to lock into each other. Broadened bandwidth for effective concurrent energy harvesting is thus achieved, and at the same time, the beam deflection is slightly mitigated and fully utilized for power conversion. The experiment shows that with the stopper-bluff body distance of 19.5 mm, the output power from the proposed harvesting device increases steadily from 3.0 mW at 17.3 Hz to 3.8 mW at 19.1 Hz at a wind speed of 5.5 m/s and a base acceleration of 0.5 g. A guideline for the stopper configuration is also provided for performance enhancement of the broadband concurrent wind and vibration energy harvester.