Study the influence of adding fins to the plate of the solar collector on thermal performance under natural phenomena

Abstract

To date, most of previous models related to adding fins inside Flat Plate Solar Collector (FPSC) have been carried out under steady-state heat flux and using active-methods for circulating the operating fluid. Therefore, the main purpose of this work is to investigate the thermal response of two developed finned-FPSC models under transient heat flux conditions with using passive systems. The first developed model (model-A-) include straight fins, while the second model with wavy fins (model-B-). Experimental tests are conducted in Baghdad – Iraq, while the numerical results are obtained by using Ansys Fluent CFD. The results indicated that the difference between numerical results and experimental findings is 8.12% for the average water temperature in a tank, while the operating fluid temperature at the exit of the rising pipe is about 8.36%. Furthermore, all new models outperform traditional models in terms of output performance. Moreover, the mass flow rate of model -B- is higher than that of model-A- and traditional models. (Model -B-) was found to be the best model among all others under the current study. The thermal performance of (model -B-) was found to be 16.7% higher than the traditional model in terms of water temperature inside the tank, while the operating fluid temperature at the outlet was increased by 16.2%. In addition, the overall thermal efficiency of the collector for the enhanced (model-B-) is increased by about 20.8% compared to the traditional model. The improved transient model (model-B-) presented in this work shall add a better enhancement to the FPSC behavior of the passive systems.