Theoretical and Experimental Study of the Thermal Performance of a Multi-use Solar Device

Abstract

The motivation behind the development of a multi-use solar device is to overcome the disadvantages of three single-use devices: solar water heater, dryer, and space heater. The main disadvantages of the previous devices are a big size and high cost. Integrating the three devices into one with modifications is the subject of this research to reduce the cost, size, improve the performance, and increase the usage. A multi-purpose solar device was constructed to test the concept of a multi-use solar device for drying, water heating, and space heating. Further, a thermal model was developed to investigate the thermal performance of the proposed device. Experimental tests were carried out to validate the model results. Cost analysis was done for comparison. The results show the effects of integrating the water and space heater in the solar dryer performance. The drying air temperature was reduced to reasonable values for the drying of agricultural products. The drying temperature was decreased by about 5.1 to 14.1 ºC according to the rate of the hot water consumption for the water and space heating purposes. The weight loss percentage of the dried product (peppermint leaves) had a value of 91.9 % compared to 85.14 % for the single-use dryer. The study shows that the proposed device reduces the cost and size by about 32.4 and 59.3 %, respectively, compared to having three devices. There was a good agreement between the theoretical and experimental results. Consequently, the simulation model can be considered as a valuable tool for researchers.