Power harvesting for railroad track health monitoring using piezoelectric and inductive devices

Nelson, Carl A.; Platt, S. R.; Albrecht, Dave; Kamarajugadda, Vedvyas; Fateh, Mahmood

doi:10.1117/12.775884

Cited by 48 publications

(48 citation statements)

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“…In 2008, Nelson et al 9 investigated the possibility of scavenging electrical power from railcar traffic by deploying piezoelectric and inductive voice-coil techniques. Passing railcars cause longitudinal strain in a piezoelectric device mounted to the bottom of a rail.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

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On-track testing of a power harvesting device for railroad track health monitoring

Hansen

Pourghodrat

Nelson

et al. 2010

Health Monitoring of Structural and Biological Systems 2010

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A considerable proportion of railroad infrastructure exists in regions which are comparatively remote. With regard to the cost of extending electrical infrastructure into these areas, road crossings in these areas do not have warning light systems or crossing gates and are commonly marked with reflective signage. For railroad track health monitoring purposes, distributed sensor networks can be applicable in remote areas, but the same limitation regarding electrical infrastructure is the hindrance. This motivated the development of an energy harvesting solution for remote railroad deployment. This paper describes on-track experimental testing of a mechanical device for harvesting mechanical power from passing railcar traffic, in view of supplying electrical power to warning light systems at crossings and to remote networks of sensors. The device is mounted to and spans two rail ties and transforms the vertical rail displacement into electrical energy through mechanical amplification and rectification into a PMDC generator. A prototype was tested under loaded and unloaded railcar traffic at low speeds. Stress analysis and speed scaling analysis are presented, results of the on-track tests are compared and contrasted to previous laboratory testing, discrepancies between the two are explained, and conclusions are drawn regarding suitability of the device for illuminating high-efficiency LED lights at railroad crossings and powering track-health sensor networks.

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Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The safety factor of both the rack and pinion gears was calculated to be 25, using Equation 9. SF = σ y /σ max ( 9 ) Here, σ y is the yield strength of the rack and pinion gears and σ max is the maximum stress in the rack or pinion gear teeth.…”

Section: Stressmentioning

confidence: 99%

On-track testing of a power harvesting device for railroad track health monitoring

Hansen

Pourghodrat

Nelson

et al. 2010

Health Monitoring of Structural and Biological Systems 2010

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“…Nelson et al, [4] present a method to implement power harvesting for monitoring the health of railroad tracks with data from measurements on a real railroad track implementation. Energy harvesting for structural monitoring is discussed by Park et al, [5] and the possibility of wireless energy transfer using RF power is also tested in a similar setting [6].…”

Section: Applications Of Energy Harvestingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reincarnation in the Ambiance: Devices and Networks with Energy Harvesting

Prasad

Devasenapathy

Rao

et al. 2014

IEEE Commun. Surv. Tutorials

101

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Abstract-Miniaturization of devices with higher computational capacity coupled with advancement in communication technologies is driving the growth of deployment of sensors and actuators in our surroundings. To keep up the pace with this growth, these tiny, battery-powered devices need small-sized and high-energy density batteries for longer operation time, which calls for improvement in battery technologies. An alternative is to harvest energy from the environment. An important aspect of energy harvesting is that the devices go through birth and death cycle with respect to their power unlike battery powered ones. Another important aspect is that context information is also generated while devices harvest energy from their ambiance. In this article we provide a comprehensive study of various types of energy harvesting techniques. We then provide some models used in energy harvesting systems and the design of such systems. We also throw light on the power management and networking aspects of the energy harvesting devices. At the end we discuss the major issues and avenues for further research.

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“…For instance, an electromagnetic mechanism converting pulse-like linear vibration into regulated rotational motion was presented in [12]; a wide-band piezoelectric harvester was designed in [13] to generate power in various frequency regions; a piezoelectric generator installed under the sleeper, was used to scavenge energy from vertical vibrations of the track [14]; a device mounted on railties (sleepers) was used to converted the vertical displacement of the rail into electrical energy through mechanical amplification and rectification [15]; a comparison between an inductive coil device driven by the vertical rail displacement, and a piezoelectric device driven by the longitudinal strain produced by rail bending was presented in [16]. Several other power harvesting devices capable of scavenging power from the vertical deflection of railroad track are discussed in [17], and simulations on the maximum power potential for different prototypes along with their optimal number and location are presented in [18].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Harvesting energy from the vibration of a passing train using a single-degree-of-freedom oscillator

Gatti

Brennan

Tehrani

et al. 2016

Mechanical Systems and Signal Processing

104

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a b s t r a c tWith the advent of wireless sensors, there has been an increasing amount of research in the area of energy harvesting, particularly from vibration, to power these devices. An interesting application is the possibility of harvesting energy from the track-side vibration due to a passing train, as this energy could be used to power remote sensors mounted on the track for strutural health monitoring, for example. This paper describes a fundamental study to determine how much energy could be harvested from a passing train. Using a time history of vertical vibration measured on a sleeper, the optimum mechanical parameters of a linear energy harvesting device are determined. Numerical and analytical investigations are both carried out. It is found that the optimum amount of energy harvested per unit mass is proportional to the product of the square of the input acceleration amplitude and the square of the input duration. For the specific case studied, it was found that the maximum energy that could be harvested per unit mass of the oscillator is about 0.25 J/kg at a frequency of about 17 Hz. The damping ratio for the optimum harvester was found to be about 0.0045, and the corresponding amplitude of the relative displacement of the mass is approximately 5 mm.

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Power harvesting for railroad track health monitoring using piezoelectric and inductive devices

Cited by 48 publications

References 0 publications

On-track testing of a power harvesting device for railroad track health monitoring

On-track testing of a power harvesting device for railroad track health monitoring

Reincarnation in the Ambiance: Devices and Networks with Energy Harvesting

Harvesting energy from the vibration of a passing train using a single-degree-of-freedom oscillator

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