A Bidirectional T‐Shaped Energy Harvester: Modeling, Simulation, and Experiment

Abstract

Piezoelectric cantilever beams are broadly implemented in energy harvesting. However, simple cantilever‐shaped harvesters are mostly unimodal. Herein, a T‐shaped cantilever beam harvester that can have a bimodal amplitude–frequency curve is developed. The modal of the system is designed in COMSOL finite‐element software and the dynamic behavior is carried out using the finite element simulation. Then, validation experiments are used to estimate the results of finite‐element analysis and it is concluded that the simulation results are in good agreement with the experimental data. Furthermore, the frequency response curves are plotted for various system parameters so as to discuss the influence of these parameters on the bandwidth of the harvester. It is found that there is an optimal resistance that can obtain the P = 2.87 mW maximum power. Finally, theoretical modeling is established and exact analytical solutions are derived, and the comparisons of theoretical, numerical, and experimental results are implemented. It is found that the results of these three methods are consistent. In addition, all of these predictions show that the bidirectional coupling induces the bandwidth increases.