EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF THERMAL PERFORMANCE OF FLAT-PLATE SOLAR AIR HEATER HAVING ROUGHENED (RHOMBUS SHAPE) ABSORBER PLATE

An experimental investigation has been carried out for a range of system an operating parameters in order to analyze effect of artificial roughness on thermal performance in flat plate solar air heater having rhombus shape (sheet metal) as roughness geometry. Duct has an aspect ratio W/H of 7, relative pitch (p/e) range of 40 to 60 and Reynolds Number (R_e) range from to 5100 to 28000. A considerable increase in thermal performance has been observed.