Multi-directional energy harvesting by piezoelectric cantilever-pendulum with internal resonance

This letter reports a piezoelectric cantilever-pendulum design for multi-directional energy harvesting. A pendulum is attached to the tip of a piezoelectric cantilever-type energy harvester. This design aims at taking advantage of the nonlinear coupling between the pendulum motion in 3-dimensional space and the beam bending vibration at resonances. Experimental studies indicate that, under properly chosen parameters, 1: 2 internal resonance can be induced, which enables the multi-directional energy harvesting with a single cantilever. The advantages of the design with respect to traditional piezoelectric cantilever are examined. (C) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.