Abstract:
This research was performed for designing, fabricating and testing a lightweight flat plate solarcollector (LW-SC). The absorber was made by polypropylene sheet whereas the cover plate wasmade by polycarbonate sheet. The water flows through the inner chambers of polypropylene sheetwhich were connected into a polypropylene pipes. The total area of solar collector was 2.72 m2(1.172 m ? 2.32 m). When compared to a conventional solar collector, with metallic absorber, theweight of the LW-SC is lower by 50 % that is extremely important. The water capacity of the LW-SC is26 kg, much higher than the commercial collector which is about 22.5 kg. Testing the performanceof LW-SC was conducted following the ASHRAE 93-77 standard. Under steady state condition, byusing constant water flow rate of 0.02 kg/s.m2 and considering different constant water inlettemperature, the results showed that the collector efficiency and heat losses, FR(??)e and FRUL, are0.4221 and 5.7747 W/m2 oC respectively. Next, the LW-SC was tested in real mode operation withclosed water loop. Obviously, performance from this series could not be used as standards but simplyused for research and constraint verification. In the this case, the water flow rate varied between0.00277, 0.00555, 0.00833 and 0.01111 kg/s. Experimental testing showed that temperature as high as100oC was reached at the collector outlet with high storage tank temperature.Due to its lightweight, good performance and reasonable cost, commercial development seems to bepromising as it could be used for various applications including industrial and residential sectors.