Absorber Tube with Internal Hinged Blades for Solar Parabolic Trough Collector

Solar parabolic collectors exploit solar energy for both thermal and power generation applications. But, they demand long arrays of reflective concentrating surfaces with receiver tube throughout the length of axis of the concentrators. For one and half meter long parabolic trough with aluminium sheet as reflective surface, experimental analysis was done attempting to increase the energy transfer rate and reduce the length of arrays. Two absorber tubes were fabricated and distilled water was used as the working fluid in the tubes. The modified absorber tube with hinged blades delivered an average efficiency of 69.33% compared to 60.82% obtained for simple conventional absorber tube. Plots for performance results of the tubes with varying direct normal irradiance and mass flow rates were obtained. Slope and intercept values of 70.887 and -0.419 respectively were obtained for the collector equation of absorber tubes hinged blades compared to slope and intercept values of 61.571 and -0.401 respectively. The present work delivers better performance compared to earlier works Thus, the proposal present its scope for both domestic and industrial applications. (C) 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.