REDUCED-ORDER MODELING OF ENERGY HARVESTERS

摘要

This work addresses the accuracy and convergence of reduced-order models (ROMs) of energy harvesters. Two types of energy harvesters are considered, a magnetostrictive rod in axial vibrations and a piezoelectric cantilever beam in traverse oscillations. The partial differential equations (PDEs) and associated boundary conditions governing the motion of these harvesters are obtained. The eigenvalue problem is then solved for the exact eigenvalues and modeshapes. Furthermore, an exact expression for the steady-sate output power is attained by direct solution of the PDEs. Subsequently, the results are compared to a ROM attained following the Rayleigh-Ritz procedure. It is observed that the eigenvalues and output power near the first resonance frequency are more accurate and has a much faster convergence to the exact solution for the piezoelectric cantilever beam. In addition, it is shown that the convergence is governed by two dimensionless constants, one that is related to the electromechanical coupling and the other to the ratio between the time constant of the mechanical oscillator and the harvesting circuit. Using these results, conclusions are drawn with regards to the design values for which the common single-mode ROM is accurate.