Open Access

ARTICLE

Experimental Performance Analysis of a Corrugation Type Solar Air Heater (CTSAH)

Aravindh Madhavankutty Ambika^1,2,*, Aarjab Ghimire², Sreekumar Appukuttan²

1 Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, Government of India, New Delhi, 110003, India
2 Department of Green Energy Technology, Madanjeet School of Green Energy Technologies, Pondicherry University, Puducherry, 605014, India

* Corresponding Author: Aravindh Madhavankutty Ambika. Email:

(This article belongs to the Special Issue: Modeling of Artificial Intelligence controller for Microgrid and SmartGrid application)

Energy Engineering 2022, 119(4), 1483-1499. https://doi.org/10.32604/ee.2022.017618

Received 25 May 2021; Accepted 26 August 2021; Issue published 23 May 2022

Abstract

This paper explains the experimental performance evaluation of a Corrugated Type Solar Air Heater (CTSAH) for understanding its performance in a humid tropical climatic condition in Puducherry, India. This helps in understanding its effectiveness in using it for drying application of products like seafood, etc. Experiments were conducted at different mass flow rates and their effect on the heat gain, efficiency, friction factor heat transfer, etc., was analyzed. Experiments were carried out at different mass flow rates, i.e., M1 = 0.06 kg/s, M2 = 0.14 kg/s, M3 = 0.17 kg/s, M4 = 0.25 kg/s, M5 = 0.3 kg/s, and were conducted from 11:00 h to 14:00 h. The air inlet & air temperature is found to be at an average of 40°C whereas the incident solar radiation is at an average of 795 W/m². Experimental results show that the optimum performance of the CTSAH is in the mass flow rate range of 0.14–0.25 (kg/s). Also, the calculated useful heat produced, convective heat transfer coefficients, effective efficiency, optical efficiency provides knowledge on the potential use of the air heater.

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Keywords

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