Energy Harvesting and Wireless Data Transmission System for Rotor Instrumentation in Electrical Machines

Itisdesirabletomeasurerotorquantitiessuchascurrentsandtemperaturesinanelectricalmachine for design verification and condition monitoring purposes. A Bluetooth module which sends data from the rotor was previously reported in literature, but this module was battery powered, and therefore the duration of the tests was limited. This paper presents a solution to this problem by developing a rotor-mounted power supply system which can harvest energy from the magnetic field inside the machine, by fixing an external loop to the rotor and making use of the induced voltage in the loop. A full-bridge rectifier, boost converter and battery charging module was developed to supply sufficient power to a bespoke Blue tooth transmission system and associated sensor circuitry.