Development of a rotary piezoelectric energy harvester using magnetic excitation inspired by the fan blade

This work proposes a new rotary piezoelectric energy harvester using magnetic excitation inspired by the fan blade. The configuration and operating principle of the harvester are introduced. Then, the equivalent nonlinear model of the piezoelectric beam is established based on the Euler-Bernoulli theory and the Rayleigh-Ritz method. Finite element simulation is used to obtain the vibration performance of the piezoelectric beam, and the first order natural frequency is obtained as 22.059 Hz. A prototype of the proposed harvester is developed, and a series of experiments are carried out. The effect of magnet deflection angle, magnet mass, and the number of magnets on the output performance of the harvester is studied in detail by experiments. The experimental results proved that the harvester obtained a relatively better output performance when the deflection angle of the drive magnet is 30°. In addition, the harvester generated the maximum output voltage when the rotary speed is 165 rpm, which is consistent with the simulation result. The harvester achieved an average power of 43.5 mW when the resistance was 130 kΩ under the rotary speed of 165 rpm. The output power can satisfy the power consumption of low-power electronic devices, such as LEDs, calculators, and electronic meters.