Flat Plate Air Collector

In flat plate air collector, the working fluid is air which is freely and easily available in atmosphere. The analysis is similar to liquid flat plate collector except the physical properties of working fluid (air) and design parameters, namely flat plate air collector efficiency (F′) and mass flow rate factor/heat removal factor \(\left( {F_{R} } \right)\) . It is also referred as solar air collector (SAC) and has many applications like indirect drying and space heating. In this chapter, many combinations of solar air collectors, namely parallel (m), series (N), parallel and series (m \(\times\) N) and series and parallel (N \(\times\) m) combinations, have been discussed to determine the outlet air temperature \(\left( {T_{fo} } \right)\) , the rate of useful thermal energy \(\left( {\mathop Q\limits^{`}_{u} } \right)\) , mass flow rate factor \(\left( {F_{R} } \right)\) and instantaneous thermal efficiency \(\left( {\eta_{i} } \right)\) .