785 research outputs found

    Bounds on the vibrational energy that can be harvested from random base motion

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    This paper is concerned with the development of upper bounds on the energy harvesting performance of a general multi-degree-of-freedom nonlinear electromechanical system that is subjected to random base motion and secondary applied periodic forces. The secondary forces are applied with the aim of enhancing the energy harvested from the base motion, and they may constitute direct excitation, or they may produce parametric terms in the equations of motion. It is shown that when the base motion has white noise acceleration then the power input by the base is always πS0M/2πS0M/2 where S0 is the single sided spectral density of the acceleration, and M is the mass of the system. This implies that although the secondary forces may enhance the energy harvested by causing a larger fraction of the power input from the base to be harvested rather than dissipated, there is an upper limit on the power that can be harvested. Attention is then turned to narrow band excitation, and it is found that in the absence of secondary forces a bound can be derived for a single degree of freedom system with linear damping and arbitrary nonlinear stiffness. The upper bound on the power input by the base is πMmax[S(ω)]/2, where S(ω)S(ω) is the single sided base acceleration spectrum. The validity of this result for more general systems is found to be related to the properties of the first Wiener kernel, and this issue is explored analytically and by numerical simulation.This work was funded in part through the EPSRC Programme Grant “Engineering Nonlinearity” EP/K003836/1.This is the final published version. It originally appeared at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022460X14009092#

    Scaling of slow-drift motion with platform size and its importance for floating wind turbines

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    Slow drift is a large, low-frequency motion of a floating platform caused by nonlinear hydrodynamic forces. Although slow drift is a well-known phenomenon for ships and other floating structures, new platforms for floating wind turbines are significantly smaller in scale, and it is yet to be established how important slow drift is for them. In this paper we derive an approximate expression for the scaling of the slow drift motion with platform size, mooring characteristics and wave conditions. This suggests that slow drift may be less important for floating wind turbines than other, larger, floating structures. The accuracy of the approximations is discussed; in the one case where detailed data is available, the approximate result is found to be conservative by a factor of up to 40.Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (doctoral training award ID: 1089390), GL Garrad Hassa

    Analysis of the power flow in nonlinear oscillators driven by random excitation using the first Wiener kernel

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    Random excitation of mechanical systems occurs in a wide variety of structures and, in some applications, calculation of the power dissipated by such a system will be of interest. In this paper, using the Wiener series, a general methodology is developed for calculating the power dissipated by a general nonlinear multi-degree-of freedom oscillatory system excited by random Gaussian base motion of any spectrum. The Wiener series method is most commonly applied to systems with white noise inputs, but can be extended to encompass a general non-white input. From the extended series a simple expression for the power dissipated can be derived in terms of the first term, or kernel, of the series and the spectrum of the input. Calculation of the first kernel can be performed either via numerical simulations or from experimental data and a useful property of the kernel, namely that the integral over its frequency domain representation is proportional to the oscillating mass, is derived. The resulting equations offer a simple conceptual analysis of the power flow in nonlinear randomly excited systems and hence assist the design of any system where power dissipation is a consideration. The results are validated both numerically and experimentally using a base-excited cantilever beam with a nonlinear restoring force produced by magnets

    Complex but negligible: Non-linearity of the inertial coupling between the platform and blades of floating wind turbines

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    Approximate linearised models can be important for preliminary design of floating wind turbines, but their value depends on how well they approximate the real-world non-linear behaviour. This paper focuses on the non-linear inertial coupling between motion of the floating platform and the blade dynamics, using a simplified model to demonstrate how the inertial coupling works, and systematically studying the linearity of the dynamic blade response to different directions, amplitudes and frequencies of motion. Simplified equations of motion are derived and approximately solved analytically, showing that the blade response contains harmonics at a range of frequencies, some linear and some non-linear in the amplitude of the platform motion. Comparison to numerical simulations shows that the analytical results were qualitatively useful but inaccurate for large platform motions. Because of the multiple harmonics in the response, there are more combinations of rotor speeds and platform motions leading to large resonant blade responses and non-linear behaviour than might be expected. Overall, for realistically low rotor speeds and platform frequencies (below 20 rpm and 0.2 Hz), non-linear inertial loading due to platform motion should be negligible. The implications of this work for the use of linearised structural models and the relevance of scale model testing are discussed

    The effect of generalized force correlations on the response statistics of a harmonically driven random system

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    If the physical properties of a structural component are sufficiently random then the statistical distribution of the natural frequencies and mode shapes tends to a universal distribution associated with the Gaussian Orthogonal Ensemble (GOE) of random matrices. Previous work has exploited this result to yield expressions for the relative variance of the energy of the response of a random system to harmonic excitation. The derivation of these expressions employed random point process theory, and in the theoretical development it was assumed that the modal generalised forces were uncorrelated. Although this assumption is often valid, there are cases in which correlations between the generalised forces can significantly affect the response variance, and in the present work the existing theory is extended to include correlations of this type. The extended theory is applicable to both single frequency responses and to band average responses, and the developed closed form expressions are validated by comparison with direct simulations for a random plate structure.Elke Deckers contribution was funded through The Research Fund KU Leuve
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