Performance of Serpentine Flow Solar Water Heater using Different Mass Flowrate

Abstract

The utilization of Solar Water Heating Systems (SWHS) is a potential solution to use as an alternative to fuel and electricity in areas where these resources are scarce, costly, and not easily accessible. Research was conducted in Duhok City, Kurdistan of Iraq to evaluate the efficiency of a traditional type of SWHS, namely the serpentine collector variant. An active system collector that employed a moving water pump to facilitate the circulation of water inside the systems was used in the experiment. An analysis was conducted to assess the performance of the collector concerning solar irradiation, wind speed, and mass flow rate. This study utilized a Flat Plate Collector (FPC) with a tubular serpentine shape absorber made of steel sheet and copper tube. The serpentine collector had a maximum total heat loss coefficient of 5.53 . The serpentine collector demonstrated its highest level of practical heat gains at 561W. Its performance was observed to improve with increasing solar irradiation and water mass flow rate, but declined when wind speed exceeded the rated values. The serpentine collector achieved maximum efficiency with a flowrate of 0.042 kg/s, resulting in a productivity of 66.6%. While the maximum increase in water tank temperature in the serpentine collector was 25.8 ℃ at the mass flowrate 0.05 kg/s.

Keywords

• Solar water heating system
• Serpentine collector
• Copper tube
• Heating water
• Storage temperature