Development of a Self-Powered Sensor, Storage and Transmission System for Structural Health Monitoring

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PARULEKAR-THESIS-2018.pdf (9.24 MB)

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2018-07-31

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Abstract

A self-powered sensor, storage and transmission system was developed for Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of transportation infrastructure to mitigate breakdown of roads and provide insights on the health of civil infrastructure prior to actual breakdown. The proposed system, to be embedded under the surface of the road, is designed to power up and enable wireless transmission in a transceiver. The source of power is thermo-electric, which eliminates the need for batteries, keeping in mind the limitations of battery life in the context of the life-cycle of roads, the latter having a much longer lifespan. The voltage from the Thermoelectric Generator (TEG) is boosted and subsequently regulated to a usable voltage for the proposed application. Vibrations from oncoming cars on the road are converted to an analog voltage by a piezoelectric device. This is fed to the MSP430F2274 micro-controller, which is a part of the End Device (ED), which also has a wireless CC2500 transceiver embedded on-board. The micro-controller has an ADC (analog to digital converter) which digitizes the voltage. This is subsequently transmitted wirelessly by the transceiver to a receiver on an Access Point (AP) when the latter is in range. The transceiver/controller board has a memory of 32 kB, which can be enhanced using external memory. This will be used for storing oncoming data until an Access Point device is in range, at which point, the digitized data is transmitted. The array of data received at the Access Point is analyzed to collect statistical information including number of vehicles (type, weight etc.) and further studied for insights into breakdown of the road.

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Structural Health Monitoring, Thermo-Electric Generator, Analog to Digital Converter, Radio Frequency, Direct Current, Bismuth Telluride, Access Point, End Device

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https://hdl.handle.net/1969.1/188948

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Electronic Theses, Dissertations, and Records of Study (2002– )