Design and Fabrication of Speed Bump Power Generation System
Authors: Baribuma Gbaarabe, Howells I. Hart and Barinyima Nkoi
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Abstract
This study explores the practicality of power generation from road speed bumps by harvesting the energy of moving vehicles using a mechanical speed bump design with rack-andpinion mechanism and spring system. It includes design analysis and prototype fabrication. The model design using Autodesk Inventor helps to validate the practicality of the system design in addition to the prototype fabrication. An experimental test and a theoretical energy assessment were carried out when an average weight of 392N was applied on the fabricated prototype. In this analysis, the mechanical input power, electrical output power and energy conversion efficiency were evaluated as 203.84W, 1.112W and 0.6%, respectively. A MATLAB program code consistent with this performance was obtained for evaluating the actual performance of the system, from which an average weight of 10.91kN acting on the tyres of vehicles generate 32.52W of power. The proposed system design gives new impulse to research on renewable power systems.