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US 2026/0095112 A1Published application
Pendulum based frequency-up converter for vibration energy harvesting
AssigneeUniversity of Maryland, Baltimore County
InventorSoobum LEE
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A pendulum based frequency up converter that effectively captures a low-speed mechanical rotation into high-frequency vibration of a piezoelectric cantilever beam is disclosed. The pendulum based frequency-up converter for cantilevered piezoelectric energy harvesters can be used to efficiently utilize low rotational motion of wind turbine blades, and other slow rotating structures, to implement a self-powering sensor network to monitor the health of wind turbine blades.
Claims15
A pendulum based frequency-up converter device comprising:
- a pendulum having a length rP, wherein the pendulum has a first end and a second end, wherein the first end is a fixed pivot point and the pendulum swings, relative to the fixed pivot point, in a circular sector of angle 2θmag, and the pendulum further comprises a fourth magnet fixed at the second end at rP;
- and
- three fixed magnets, wherein a first magnet and a second magnet are fixed at a first outer bound and a second outer bound of the circular sector, respectively, and a third magnet is positioned at angle θmag from either outer bound at a magnet distance rM from the fixed pivot point, wherein rM is greater than rP.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.