Impulsive parametric damping in energy harvesting

Abstract

In this paper, an electro-mechanical system with a time-varying damper, which is capable of changing the damping coefficient impulsively, is considered. The effect of the impulsive parametric damping to the modal energy content of the mechanical system is investigated analytically as well as numerically. First, the governing differential equation is presented and then the solution of the system's response is obtained through numerical integration. The energy dissipated by the damper is then calculated to investigate the amount of the energy that can be harvested, and the results are compared with the results from a system without parametric impulses. It is shown, that the amount of the harvested energy can be increased by introducing parametric impulses. Then, an analytical formulation is derived for the system using Dirac-Delta impulses and the analytical results are validated with numerical simulations. The device is subjected to an initial condition and therefore is vibrating freely without any base excitation. This could be used for applications such as harvesting energy from the passage of a train, where the train vibration can introduce an initial velocity to the harvester and the energy can then be extracted from the free vibration of the harvester.