Experimental Study of a Shoe-Embedded Human Mechanical Energy Harvester

Abstract:
This study developed a human mechanical energy harvester shoes which can generate energy by walking to charge portable electronic devices. This shoe consists of harvester and folding heel (FH) structure. The FH mounts in the heel part of shoe and the energy harvester is embedded in FH, the harvester can turn linear foot motion into rotated motion of the generator. The rotation of rotor can be accelerated by the gear case inside the generator. Experiments indicated that the harvester could generate a max average power of approximately 600 mW by normal walking. Compared to other harvesters, the energy harvester shoes in this study is more concealed, and contain a lot extra room for some electronic devices like a GPS module.