A bistable point absorber wave energy convertor with a mechanical motion rectifier

Abstract

The design of novel wave energy converters (WECs) with the capability of low frequency energy capture is of great significance for the development of low frequency ocean wave energy. In this study, a novel point absorber WEC combined with a bistable mechanism and a mechanical motion rectifier (MMR) is proposed to achieve the goal of efficiently capturing wave energy in the low frequency range. In the WEC, the introduction of a rack-pinion-lever-spring (RPLS) bistable mechanism can not only enhance the capture efficiency in a low frequency range but also protect the system from excessive vibration amplitude through the nonlinear stiffness. Besides, one MMR based power take off (PTO) system is proposed to convert the bidirectional vibration into unidirectional rotation of the generator and extract more power via the mechanism of two one-way pinions. The dynamic model in the time domain for the nonlinear point absorber WEC with the RPLS bistable mechanism and the MMR based PTO system is established in which the convolution term is replaced by the state space method. The characteristics of the nonlinear dynamics and wave energy capture performance for the novel WEC are analysed in regular wave condition. The numerical results demonstrate that the peak capture width ratio of the proposed WEC can reach almost 2 times that of the traditional linear system in a lower frequency range.