Design and manufacture of perpendicular bi-stable cantilever for vibrational energy harvesting on the basis of stochastic resonance

Abstract

This paper describes extremely simple configuration of novel vibrational energy harvester, which can harness low frequency (less than 5 Hz, such as various environmental vibrations) over a broad frequency band for the first time. A design that utilizes a phenomenon called stochastic resonance can give significantly enhanced vibration mode for increasing efficiency, and simple bi-stable cantilever with tip mass installed a basement vertically fulfils the requirements for stochastic resonance. We fabricated bi-stable cantilever with tip mass and validated whether the cantilever could be used as an effective low frequency vibration energy harvester. In the experiment, when a 1 Hz periodic force and environmental noise vibration were applied, stochastic resonance occurred. The amplitude of the energy harvester increased over tenfold (over 30 mm).