Experimental Studies on a Solar Air Heater Having V-Corrugated Absorber Plate with Obstacles Bent Vertically

Abstract

A solar air heater (SAH) is a simple heater using solar radiation that is useful for drying or space heating. Unfortunately, heat transfer from the absorber plate to the air inside the solar air heater is low. Some researchers reported that obstacles are able to improve the heat transfer in a flat plate solar air collector and others found that a v-corrugated absorber plate gives better heat transfer than a flat plate. Yet, no work of combining these two findings is found.This paper describes the result of experimental study on a SAH with v-corrugated absorber plate and obstacles bent vertically started from 80oto 0owith interval 10oon its bottom plate. Experiments were conducted indoor at five different Reynolds numbers (1447 Re 7237) and three different radiation intensities (430, 573, and 716 W/m2).It is found that the obstacles improve SAH performance. Both the air temperature rise and efficiency increase with inserting obstacles bent at any angle vertically. Unfortunately, the air pressure drop is increasing, too. Obstacles bent vertically at smaller angle (means more straight) give higher air temperature rise and efficiency. However, the optimum angle is found 30o. The air temperature rise and efficiency will be 5.3% lower when the obstacles bent 30oinstead of 0o, but the pressure drop will be 17.2% lower.