ACKNOWLEDGMENTSMuch thanks to my advisor, Dr. Berfield, for giving me direction and an opportunity to achieve something I never thought I could have in this life. The gift of confidence, knowledge, and teamwork will serve me well. I wish him the best.I would like to thank my mother, father, sister, and brother for their love and support throughout this long endeavor. Knowing I have a loving family who encouraged me to grasp the best life has to offer keeps my resolve strong and my potential limitless.Thanks to my friends, Kyle Hord, Trung Hoang, Russel Prater, Andrew Work, and Tim Broering who kept me sane during long and rigorous work hours, they are of great importance and may never know how greatly needed they were and are.Lastly I would like to thank the Mechanical Engineering Department which through the long years has granted me the know-how to solve problems in the field of mechanical engineering. Problem solving is a feat no one should live without.Most men and women struggle all their lives for fame or money… mine was and always will be knowledge. This dissertation investigates a novel method of actuating the primary buckled energy harvesting structure using torque arms as a force amplification mechanism.Buckled structures can exhibit snap-through and has the potential to broaden the operating frequency for the VEH. Macro and MEMS size prototypes are fabricated and evaluated via a custom made shaker table. The effect of compliance arms, which pin the center beam with piezoelectric strips, are also evaluated along with damping ratios. ANSYS models evaluating generated power are created for use in future optimization studies. Lastly, high energy orbitals (HEO) are observed in the devices.Results show that buckling lowers and broadens the output power of the new devices. Reverse sweeps drastically increase the operating frequency during snap-through.Rectangular compliance arms made of poly-lactic acid (PLA) generated the most power of all compliance arms tested. HEO performance can be induced by perturbing the system while maintaining the same input force which increases power output.