U-shape magnetostrictive harvester: design and experimental validation

Electromagnetic vibrational harvesters stand out due to their high-power density, long-life robust structure and low-cost design. Moreover, they can be designed using magnetostrictive materials. The mechanical vibrations cause stress on the magnetostrictive material, leading to variations in its magnetization. This, in turn, induces an electromotive force (EMF) in a well-designed pick-up coil system, thereby transforming mechanical energy into electrical energy. In spite of the potentiality of these electromagnetic harvesters, their practical implementation is limited due to the difficulties in the design optimization in terms of the device dimensions, effective stresses on the magnetostrive material, distribution and magnetic field strength of the permanent magnets and pick-up coil characteristics. Finite Element Methods (FEM) enable the estimation of the induced voltage and thus the output power as a function of harvester design parameters, allowing us to experiment with different configurations and identify optimal parameters.