Nonlinear energy harvesting based on a modified snap-through mechanism

A modified snap-through mechanism is used in an electromagnetic energy harvester to improve its effectiveness. It mainly comprises three springs that are configured so that the potential energy of the system has two stable equilibrium points. In particular, the small vibration behavior of the harvester around one of the equilibriums is of interest. A multi-scale method (MSM) is used to analyze the frequency response curve. Two snap-through mechanisms are considered. One has both horizontal and vertical springs. The other has only horizontal springs. The frequency response curves of these two classes are compared under the same excitation and electric loading conditions. The latter exhibits more bending of the frequency response curve than the former one. The results are also validated by some numerical work. The averaged power subject to the Gaussian white noise is calculated numerically, and the results demonstrate that bi-stable energy harvesting with only horizontal springs can outperform the mechanism with both horizontal and vertical springs for the same distance between two equilibriums.