Design of a fluidic test bed for MEMS piezoelectric energy harvester

Abstract

This document outlines the basic theory behind generating mathematical models, choosing materials and designing geometries for simulating a 900 mile Alaskan Pipeline. The use of dimensional analysis is useful for simulating the vibration spectrum given off in the pipeline due to turbulent flow of the fluid. In the design of Pm pg devices, that transform the mechanical vibration to electrical energy, the scaled down model will be used as a test bed for future prototype PMPG designs. After modeling the Alaskan pipeline and designing it around dimensional analysis, a Vernier Low-g accelerometer is used to measure the vibration spectrum. The frequency that was analyzed was 251.01 ± 0.447 Hz and when converted back to the Alaskan pipeline we achieved a frequency of 6.94Hz. Using this information we can design PMPG devices that will resonate in this frequency bandwidth to create a higher efficiency in mechanical to electrical conversion.