PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT OF SOLAR FLAT PLATE COLLECTOR USING FORMED TUBES

The efficiency improvement for flat-plate solar collector can reduce its size and obtain higher temperature fluid at outlet for wider application. In response to these demands, different highly-effective techniques have been used in the past to enhance the thermal performance of solar collectors including the methods of reducing the heat loss from the top surface or increasing the energy gain inside the solar converter. Many researches carried out numerous experimental and mathematical investigations on Performance improvement of solar flat plate heat collector. Enhancement techniques can be applied to flat-plate liquid solar collectors towards more compact and efficient designs. Extensive work has been carried out in order to enhance the performance of flat plate collector using former passive techniques and still there is very limited research literature available on performance enhancement using the tubes of special geometries. The Paper gives the brief look on the suitability of changing shape of tubes of special geometry. The performance of solar flat plate collector with formed tubes is compared with performance of standard circular tube. The performance parameter like collector efficiency, mass flow rate and temperature difference of such formed tubes is much less than that of circular tube.