Energy Harvesting from Shock Absorbers Via Displacement Amplification
Open Access
- Author:
- Winick, Ryan
- Area of Honors:
- Mechanical Engineering
- Degree:
- Bachelor of Science
- Document Type:
- Thesis
- Thesis Supervisors:
- Md Amanul Haque, Thesis Supervisor
Dr. Daniel Humberto Cortes Correales, Thesis Honors Advisor - Keywords:
- energy
harvest
collection
power
generation
shock absorber
suspension
vehicle
bicycle
car
displacement
amplification
gain
salvage
mechanical - Abstract:
- When a vehicle travels over an uneven road surface (such as a pot hole), kinetic energy is applied to the vehicle’s suspension. In most vehicles, that energy is isolated from passengers by some spring-damper system that serves to limit the range and velocity of motion allowed to reach the vehicle. When this happens, some portion of the kinetic energy is dissipated out of the system by the viscosity of the damper. If one desired to capture and repurpose the shock energy imparted on the vehicle by the road, it would be necessary to eliminate the energy dissipating damper and to install some subsystem between the road surface and the vehicle. Another obstacle to energy capture and reutilization exists as a result of the limitations of a standard electrical generator. Most generators perform best when their inputs are high speed and low torque, however the shock input supplied by the road surface is low speed and high force. Some energy transformation must take place before that input can be used to spin a generator. This thesis solves this problem by implementing a circular assembly of buckling beams surrounding a conventional suspension spring. The nonlinear nature of buckling beam deformation is used in place of a linkage to turn a low-speed high-force input into the desired high-speed low-force output that is best suited to power a generator. The proposed design was tested using finite element analysis to determine its optimal dimensions and parameters. It was also run through dynamic finite element analysis to determine how displacement and velocity were amplified by the buckling beam system. Input displacement was targeted at .1” for the 6” beams tested. This small displacement yielded a 4.8 gain for displacement amplification.