Proceedings of the 7th International and 45th National Conference on Fluid Mechanics and Fluid Power (FMFP)
December 10-12, 2018, IIT Bombay, Mumbai, India
Numerical Investigation of Thermo syphon Solar Flat Plate Collector with Back Layer of PCM
(Paraffin Wax)
Mulay Suraj Tryambak Abhinandan Kumar
P.G Scholar Asst. Professor
Department of Mech. Department of Mech.
Engineering, Engineering,
Govt. College of Govt. College of
Engineering, Karad, 415124 Engineering, Karad, 415124
Email: Email:
surajmulay411@gmail.com er.akanand12@gmail.com
Abstract
In the present research, performance of thermo syphon
flat plate solar collector with back layer of Phase Change
Material (PCM) is investigated numerically at various tilt
angles. In conventional collector, only sensible heat is
stored in heat transfer fluid. Very low energy density &
more space required for energy storage are main
limitations in conventional flat plate collector. With
introducing PCM in collector, latent heat is stored and
requires less space for storing same amount of energy.
Boussinesq approximation is employed in computational
model to capture buoyancy driven flow of heat transfer
fluid. Enthalpy-porosity formulation has been used for
numerical modelling of PCM. Numerical results have a
good agreement with experimental results. Numerical
results show a maximum deviation of 5% in temperature
values at outlet as compared to experimental values. From
numerical analysis, it is observed that plate gets heated
even after sun-shine period & due to this heat transfer
fluid gets useful heat gain during off-sunshine period.
Hence an increase of 25.64% average efficiency of PCM
integrated collector is noticed over conventional collector.
Keywords: PCM, LHS, CFD, Thermo syphon, Solar Flat
Plate Collector.
I. INTRODUCTION
Solar energy is one of the important alternative energy
sources which will be utilized in near future. Primary
factor that affects the utility of solar energy is that it is a
cyclic & time dependent. Hence solar energy system
requires energy storage to provide energy during night &
overcast period. Thermal Energy Storage is necessary to
success of many intermittent energy sources in meeting
demand. The present study focuses on the investigation of
1
FMFP2017–PAPER NO. 198
Waghmare A V Pise Ashok T.
H.O.D Principal,
Department of Mech. Govt. College of
Engineering Engineering,
AISSMS College of Karad, 415124
Engineering Pune 411044 Email:
Email: ashokpise@yahoo.com
avwaghmare@gmail.com
performance of thermo syphon solar flat plate collector
numerically. The purpose of this study is to determine
how much useful heat gain can be achieved by
introducing PCM into collector at tilt angles of 17.45°,
32.45° & 50°. Numerical results are validated with
experimental results. Paraffin wax is used as PCM
because of advantage associated with it. There are few
numerical analysis approaches such as artificial neural
networks, transient simulation tool (TRNSYS) , finite
element analysis (FEA) & commercial code Engineering
Equation Solver (EES) mainly[5].
Total efficiency of solar water heater with back layer of
PCM is found to be greater than that of conventional
heater in all relevant studies [1-2]. Prakash et al. [1]
noticed that average efficiency of solar heater with PCM
is 50.44% while for conventional heater is 38.04%.
Carmona et al. [3] created reduced model for a thermal
analysis of a flat plate collector with TES using PCM.
Melting & freezing behaviour of PCM is studied
numerically (2-D) by Waghmare & Pise [4]. Redzuan et
al. [5] developed CFD model for PCM integrated solar
collector.
From the literature review it is found that many authors
have studied PCM integrated solar water heater
experimentally and numerically (2-D). Very few
researchers have studied thermo syphon solar water heater
numerically. In the present research, a 3-D CFD model is
developed and analysed using Boussinesq approximation
(to capture buoyancy induced flow) & enthalpy-porosity
formulation.
II. METHODOLOGY
The performance of flat plate collector is studied
numerically. ANSYS Fluent 18.1 is used for numerical
analysis. Computational domain is developed in ANSYS
design modeller. Numerical results are validated with
experimental results. Experimental tests are carried out on  ( w) p
23rd, 24th ,25th of May with and without PCM at tilt angles  div ( wu)    div ( gradw)  Sz
t z
17.45°, 32.45° & 50° at location Karad (latitude 17.27°N (11)
& longitude 74.20°E).  ( T )
 div ( Tu )  div (kgradT )  S (12)
A. Mathematical Analysis t
The useful heat gain, overall heat loss coefficient, Numerical formulation of the PCM region:
efficiency factor, heat removal factor are calculated using  ( H )
 div ( Hu )  div (gradT )  S (13)
the basic derivation [6] with some modification wherever t
required.
H  h  h (14)
The useful energy gain of collector can be expressed as:
Where, h = sum of the sensible enthalpy.
𝑄𝑢 = 𝐴𝑐 𝐹𝑅 [𝑆 − 𝑈𝐿 (𝑇𝑖 − 𝑇𝑎 )] (1)
The enthalpy change due to the phase-change:
where, 𝐴𝑐 = Area of collector h  L (15)
𝑇𝑖 = Inlet temp. Where, β = Liquid fraction
𝑇𝑎 = Ambient temp. Domain Identification:
S = HT(𝜏. 𝛼) (2) Heat transfer on absorber plate and melting &
The heat removal factor (FR) is given by: solidification process in PCM is symmetric in lateral
𝑚̇𝑐𝑝 𝐴𝑐 𝑈𝐿 𝐹 ′ direction. That is why a symmetric domain is modelled as
𝐹𝑅 = 𝐴 [1 − exp (− 𝑚̇𝑐𝑝
)] (3) shown in Fig.1.
𝑐 𝑈𝐿

𝑄𝑢 = 𝑄𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟 + 𝑄𝑇𝐸𝑆 (4)

𝑄𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟 = 𝑚̇𝑐𝑝 (𝑇𝑜 − 𝑇𝑖 ) (5)
The instantaneous efficiency of system is given by:
𝑄𝑢
𝜂𝑖 = 𝐻 (6)
𝑇 𝐴𝑐
Rayleigh number is given by:
𝑔𝛽(𝑇𝑠 −𝑇𝑓 )𝐿3
Ra = 𝜈𝛼
(7)
Where, β = coefficient of thermal expansion, /K Figure 1: Compuational domain
ν = Kinematic viscocity, m2/s, Absorber plate & tube are considered as a solid zone &
α = Thermal diffusivity, m2/s, specified with material copper. Heat transfer fluid & PCM
L= Length of riser tube, m. are considered as fluid zones. Heat transfer fluid is water
B. Numerical Analysis & PCM is paraffin wax. Properties of PCM [4] are as
For the modelling of PCM integrated solar collector shown in table 1.
following assumptions are made: Table 1. Properties of PCM(Paraffin Wax)
 The PCM is homogeneous & isotropic Material properties
Density (kg/m3)
 Thermal resistance across the wall of the 870/960
Liquid/solid
thermal storage is negligible Specific heat (KJ/kgK) 2000
 The phase change process is unsteady & 3-D. Thermal Conductivity (w/m2k) 0.22
Latent heat (KJ/kg) 179
To study heat transfer & fluid flow in 3-D following Melting point (K) 331
governing equations [4] are used for numerical Mesh generation
formulation of heat transfer flow region & PCM region. Mesh is generated using sweep method and hexahedral
Governing Equation: elements used to achieve faster convergence & shorten
Numerical formulation of the Heat transfer fluid region: simulation time as shown in fig. 3. Inflation is provided to

 div ( u )  0 (8) HTF domain to capture boundary layer phenomenon.
t Elements at the outlet of flow are made thin & stretched
 ( u ) p to dampen the reverse flow. Reverse flow affects the
 div ( uu )    div ( gradu )  Sx (9) accuracy of solution.
t z Grid independence test:
 ( v) p Grid independence test is carried out at seven different
 div ( vu)    div ( gradv )  Sy  (    0) g
t z numbers of elements 449250, 500660, 609830, 735900,
(10) 1194110, 1301000 & 1414640. Nusselt number is
considered to decide which grid size is suitable.
2
 III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Fig. 4 & 5 show the melting and freezing process
of PCM. From Fig. 4, it is noticed that PCM starts
melting from region near the outlet where heat transfer
to heat transfer fluid is minimum. Nearly 180 minutes
required for charging process & 140 minute for
discharging process.

Figure 2: Grid independence test

From the observation it is found that the variation in
average temperature of PCM was not more than 0.19%
for configurations containing element greater than
609830. So grid independent solution obtains at 609830
numbers of elements shown in Fig. 2.
Boundary condition & initial condition:
Initially, temperature of all domains is set to
atmospheric temperature by patching all domains to 300
K temperature. Pressure inlet and pressure outlet
boundary conditions are used for fluid flow. For density
variation, Boussinesq approximation model is enabled.
Solidification & melting model is also enabled to capture
charging & discharging process. Profile file of solar flux
data has been made to give boundary condition of heat
flux to upper surface of absorber plate.
Figure 4: Charging Process of PCM

During discharging, PCM releases latent heat at constant

temp. So, absorber plate gets heated ever after sunshine
period during freezing process of PCM. In this way, we
get more useful heat gain and efficiency from the
collector.

Figure 3: Meshing of domain & Boundary conditions

Method of solution
SIMPLE pressure velocity algorithm and Body force
weighted scheme are adopted for the pressure correction
equation.
Table 2. Method of solution
Pressure Velocity Coupling

Scheme SIMPLE

Spatial Discretization

Pressure Presto/ Body force weighted

Momentum Second order upwind Figure 5: Discharging Process of PCM

Energy Second order upwind

The variation of instantaneous efficiency with respect to
time is as shown in Fig. 6. It is observed that
3
 instantaneous efficiency of conventional solar collector
was found to drop after peak hours but for the collector
with PCM acceptable efficiency was found as PCM acts
as heat source.
Figure 6:The variation of instantaneous efficiency with respect to time
Figure 7 shows comparison of average efficiency of
conventional collector with PCM integrated collector.
The efficiency for both the collectors was found low at
lower tilt angle & it increased with increase in tilt angle
upto 50°. Increasing tilt angle increases buoyancy force
on heat transfer fluid. Due to increase in buoyancy force
there will be increase in Rayleigh number (Ra). Higher
the Rayleigh number, higher will be Nusselt number.
Therefore heat transfer increases and thence efficiency.
Figure 7: Average efficiency comparison with PCM.
Validation of results:
Numerical results are compared with experimental
results for three different tilt angles. From fig. 8, it is
noticed that there exists some difference (max 5%)
between the experimental & numerical results. The reason
behind the gap could be the numerical analysis employs
perfect insulating conditions & complete heat transfer
from absorber plate to PCM & from absorber tube to
absorber fluid. However, the trends of both curves are
consistent.
4
Figure 8: Validation of numerical results with experimental results
IV. CONCLUSIONS
Back layer PCM configuration is studied to enhance the
performance of conventional collector. Collector with 50°
tilt angle gives optimum results. For the same
environmental condition it gives 25.64 % improvement in
total efficiency. During off-sunshine hour heat carried
away by the heat transfer fluid for collector without PCM
is almost negligible while for collector with PCM heat
carried away by the heat transfer fluid is considerable
(9.60 W at 20.00 pm) because PCM acts as heat source
during off sunshine period.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Dr. S.S. Mohite (HOD, mechanical
engineering, GCEK) for providing necessary facility to
conduct numerical work.
REFERENCES
[1] J.Prakash, H.P. Garg, G. Datta, A solar water heater
with a built-in latent heat storage, Energy Conversion
& Management, 25 (1985) 51-56.
[2] A.J. Khalifa, K. Suffer, M.S. Mahmoud, A sorage
domestic solar hot water system with a back layer of
phase change material, Experimental Thermal & Fluid
Science, 44 (2013) 174-181.
[3] M. Carmona, G. Caicedo, H.G. Vega, A. Bula,
Reduced model for a thermal analysis of a flat plate
solar collector with thermal energy storage using phase
change material (PCM),ASME International
Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition,
Volume 6B (2015).
[4] A.V. Waghmare, A.T.Pise, Numerical investigation of
concentric cylinder latent heat storage with/without
gravity and buoyancy, Energy Procedia, 75(2015)
3133-3141.
[5] M.Redzuan, C.N. Saw, H.H. Al-Kayiem, A. Lukmon,
Numerical simulation of PCM integrated solar
collector storage water heater, ARPN Journal of
Engineering and Applied Sciences, 12(2017) 3363-
3367.
[6] J.A. Duffie, W.A. Beckman, Solar energy of thermal
processes, John Wiley and Sons Inc., New York, 2006.
 Proceedings of the 7th International and 45th National Conference on Fluid Mechanics and Fluid Power (FMFP)
Numerical Investigation of Thermo syphon Solar Flat Plate Collector with Back Layer of PCM
(Paraffin Wax)
Mulay Suraj Tryambak Abhinandan Kumar
P.G Scholar Asst. Professor
Department of Mech. Department of Mech.
Engineering, Engineering,
Govt. College of Govt. College of
Engineering, Karad, 415124 Engineering, Karad, 415124
Email: Email:
surajmulay411@gmail.com er.akanand12@gmail.com
Abstract
In the present research, performance of thermo syphon
flat plate solar collector with back layer of Phase Change
Material (PCM) is investigated numerically at various tilt
angles. In conventional collector, only sensible heat is
stored in heat transfer fluid. Very low energy density &
more space required for energy storage are main
limitations in conventional flat plate collector. With
introducing PCM in collector, latent heat is stored and
requires less space for storing same amount of energy.
Boussinesq approximation is employed in computational
model to capture buoyancy driven flow of heat transfer
fluid. Enthalpy-porosity formulation has been used for
numerical modelling of PCM. Numerical results have a
good agreement with experimental results. Numerical
results show a maximum deviation of 5% in temperature
values at outlet as compared to experimental values. From
numerical analysis, it is observed that plate gets heated
even after sun-shine period & due to this heat transfer
fluid gets useful heat gain during off-sunshine period.
Hence an increase of 25.64% average efficiency of PCM
integrated collector is noticed over conventional collector.
Keywords: PCM, LHS, CFD, Thermo syphon, Solar Flat
Plate Collector.
V. INTRODUCTION
Solar energy is one of the important alternative energy
sources which will be utilized in near future. Primary
factor that affects the utility of solar energy is that it is a
cyclic & time dependent. Hence solar energy system
requires energy storage to provide energy during night &
overcast period. Thermal Energy Storage is necessary to
success of many intermittent energy sources in meeting
demand. The present study focuses on the investigation of
5
December 10-12, 2018, IIT Bombay, Mumbai, India
FMFP2017–PAPER NO. 198
Waghmare A V Pise Ashok T.
H.O.D Principal,
Department of Mech. Govt. College of
Engineering Engineering,
AISSMS College of Karad, 415124
Engineering Pune 411044 Email:
Email: ashokpise@yahoo.com
avwaghmare@gmail.com
performance of thermo syphon solar flat plate collector
numerically. The purpose of this study is to determine
how much useful heat gain can be achieved by
introducing PCM into collector at tilt angles of 17.45°,
32.45° & 50°. Numerical results are validated with
experimental results. Paraffin wax is used as PCM
because of advantage associated with it. There are few
numerical analysis approaches such as artificial neural
networks, transient simulation tool (TRNSYS) , finite
element analysis (FEA) & commercial code Engineering
Equation Solver (EES) mainly[5].
Total efficiency of solar water heater with back layer of
PCM is found to be greater than that of conventional
heater in all relevant studies [1-2]. Prakash et al. [1]
noticed that average efficiency of solar heater with PCM
is 50.44% while for conventional heater is 38.04%.
Carmona et al. [3] created reduced model for a thermal
analysis of a flat plate collector with TES using PCM.
Melting & freezing behaviour of PCM is studied
numerically (2-D) by Waghmare & Pise [4]. Redzuan et
al. [5] developed CFD model for PCM integrated solar
collector.
From the literature review it is found that many authors
have studied PCM integrated solar water heater
experimentally and numerically (2-D). Very few
researchers have studied thermo syphon solar water heater
numerically. In the present research, a 3-D CFD model is
developed and analysed using Boussinesq approximation
(to capture buoyancy induced flow) & enthalpy-porosity
formulation.
VI. METHODOLOGY
The performance of flat plate collector is studied
numerically. ANSYS Fluent 18.1 is used for numerical
analysis. Computational domain is developed in ANSYS
design modeller. Numerical results are validated with
experimental results. Experimental tests are carried out on  ( w) p
23rd, 24th ,25th of May with and without PCM at tilt angles  div ( wu)    div ( gradw)  Sz
t z
17.45°, 32.45° & 50° at location Karad (latitude 17.27°N (11)
& longitude 74.20°E).  ( T )
 div ( Tu )  div (kgradT )  S (12)
C. Mathematical Analysis t
The useful heat gain, overall heat loss coefficient, Numerical formulation of the PCM region:
efficiency factor, heat removal factor are calculated using  ( H )
 div ( Hu )  div (gradT )  S (13)
the basic derivation [6] with some modification wherever t
required.
H  h  h (14)
The useful energy gain of collector can be expressed as:
Where, h = sum of the sensible enthalpy.
𝑄𝑢 = 𝐴𝑐 𝐹𝑅 [𝑆 − 𝑈𝐿 (𝑇𝑖 − 𝑇𝑎 )] (1)
The enthalpy change due to the phase-change:
where, 𝐴𝑐 = Area of collector h  L (15)
𝑇𝑖 = Inlet temp. Where, β = Liquid fraction
𝑇𝑎 = Ambient temp. Domain Identification:
S = HT(𝜏. 𝛼) (2) Heat transfer on absorber plate and melting &
The heat removal factor (FR) is given by: solidification process in PCM is symmetric in lateral
𝑚̇𝑐𝑝 𝐴𝑐 𝑈𝐿 𝐹 ′ direction. That is why a symmetric domain is modelled as
𝐹𝑅 = 𝐴 [1 − exp (− 𝑚̇𝑐𝑝
)] (3) shown in Fig.1.
𝑐 𝑈𝐿

𝑄𝑢 = 𝑄𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟 + 𝑄𝑇𝐸𝑆 (4)

𝑄𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟 = 𝑚̇𝑐𝑝 (𝑇𝑜 − 𝑇𝑖 ) (5)
The instantaneous efficiency of system is given by:
𝑄𝑢
𝜂𝑖 = 𝐻 (6)
𝑇 𝐴𝑐
Rayleigh number is given by:
𝑔𝛽(𝑇𝑠 −𝑇𝑓 )𝐿3
Ra = 𝜈𝛼
(7)
Where, β = coefficient of thermal expansion, /K Figure 1: Compuational domain
ν = Kinematic viscocity, m2/s, Absorber plate & tube are considered as a solid zone &
α = Thermal diffusivity, m2/s, specified with material copper. Heat transfer fluid & PCM
L= Length of riser tube, m. are considered as fluid zones. Heat transfer fluid is water
D. Numerical Analysis & PCM is paraffin wax. Properties of PCM [4] are as
For the modelling of PCM integrated solar collector shown in table 1.
following assumptions are made: Table 1. Properties of PCM(Paraffin Wax)
 The PCM is homogeneous & isotropic Material properties
Density (kg/m3)
 Thermal resistance across the wall of the 870/960
Liquid/solid
thermal storage is negligible Specific heat (KJ/kgK) 2000
 The phase change process is unsteady & 3-D. Thermal Conductivity (w/m2k) 0.22
Latent heat (KJ/kg) 179
To study heat transfer & fluid flow in 3-D following Melting point (K) 331
governing equations [4] are used for numerical Mesh generation
formulation of heat transfer flow region & PCM region. Mesh is generated using sweep method and hexahedral
Governing Equation: elements used to achieve faster convergence & shorten
Numerical formulation of the Heat transfer fluid region: simulation time as shown in fig. 3. Inflation is provided to

 div ( u )  0 (8) HTF domain to capture boundary layer phenomenon.
t Elements at the outlet of flow are made thin & stretched
 ( u ) p to dampen the reverse flow. Reverse flow affects the
 div ( uu )    div ( gradu )  Sx (9) accuracy of solution.
t z Grid independence test:
 ( v) p Grid independence test is carried out at seven different
 div ( vu)    div ( gradv )  Sy  (    0) g
t z numbers of elements 449250, 500660, 609830, 735900,
(10) 1194110, 1301000 & 1414640. Nusselt number is
considered to decide which grid size is suitable.
6
 VII. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Fig. 4 & 5 show the melting and freezing process
of PCM. From Fig. 4, it is noticed that PCM starts
melting from region near the outlet where heat transfer
to heat transfer fluid is minimum. Nearly 180 minutes
required for charging process & 140 minute for
discharging process.

Figure 2: Grid independence test

From the observation it is found that the variation in
average temperature of PCM was not more than 0.19%
for configurations containing element greater than
609830. So grid independent solution obtains at 609830
numbers of elements shown in Fig. 2.
Boundary condition & initial condition:
Initially, temperature of all domains is set to
atmospheric temperature by patching all domains to 300
K temperature. Pressure inlet and pressure outlet
boundary conditions are used for fluid flow. For density
variation, Boussinesq approximation model is enabled.
Solidification & melting model is also enabled to capture
charging & discharging process. Profile file of solar flux
data has been made to give boundary condition of heat
flux to upper surface of absorber plate.
Figure 4: Charging Process of PCM

During discharging, PCM releases latent heat at constant

temp. So, absorber plate gets heated ever after sunshine
period during freezing process of PCM. In this way, we
get more useful heat gain and efficiency from the
collector.

Figure 3: Meshing of domain & Boundary conditions

Method of solution
SIMPLE pressure velocity algorithm and Body force
weighted scheme are adopted for the pressure correction
equation.
Table 2. Method of solution
Pressure Velocity Coupling

Scheme SIMPLE

Spatial Discretization

Pressure Presto/ Body force weighted

Momentum Second order upwind Figure 5: Discharging Process of PCM

Energy Second order upwind

The variation of instantaneous efficiency with respect to
time is as shown in Fig. 6. It is observed that
7
 instantaneous efficiency of conventional solar collector
was found to drop after peak hours but for the collector
with PCM acceptable efficiency was found as PCM acts
as heat source.
Figure 6:The variation of instantaneous efficiency with respect to time
Figure 7 shows comparison of average efficiency of
conventional collector with PCM integrated collector.
The efficiency for both the collectors was found low at
lower tilt angle & it increased with increase in tilt angle
upto 50°. Increasing tilt angle increases buoyancy force
on heat transfer fluid. Due to increase in buoyancy force
there will be increase in Rayleigh number (Ra). Higher
the Rayleigh number, higher will be Nusselt number.
Therefore heat transfer increases and thence efficiency.
Figure 7: Average efficiency comparison with PCM.
Validation of results:
Numerical results are compared with experimental
results for three different tilt angles. From fig. 8, it is
noticed that there exists some difference (max 5%)
between the experimental & numerical results. The reason
behind the gap could be the numerical analysis employs
perfect insulating conditions & complete heat transfer
from absorber plate to PCM & from absorber tube to
absorber fluid. However, the trends of both curves are
consistent.
8
Figure 8: Validation of numerical results with experimental results
VIII. CONCLUSIONS
Back layer PCM configuration is studied to enhance the
performance of conventional collector. Collector with 50°
tilt angle gives optimum results. For the same
environmental condition it gives 25.64 % improvement in
total efficiency. During off-sunshine hour heat carried
away by the heat transfer fluid for collector without PCM
is almost negligible while for collector with PCM heat
carried away by the heat transfer fluid is considerable
(9.60 W at 20.00 pm) because PCM acts as heat source
during off sunshine period.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Dr. S.S. Mohite (HOD, mechanical
engineering, GCEK) for providing necessary facility to
conduct numerical work.
REFERENCES
[1] J.Prakash, H.P. Garg, G. Datta, A solar water heater
with a built-in latent heat storage, Energy Conversion
& Management, 25 (1985) 51-56.
[2] A.J. Khalifa, K. Suffer, M.S. Mahmoud, A sorage
domestic solar hot water system with a back layer of
phase change material, Experimental Thermal &
Fluid Science, 44 (2013) 174-181.
[3] M. Carmona, G. Caicedo, H.G. Vega, A. Bula,
Reduced model for a thermal analysis of a flat plate
solar collector with thermal energy storage using
phase change material (PCM),ASME International
Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition,
Volume 6B (2015).
[4] A.V. Waghmare, A.T.Pise, Numerical investigation
of concentric cylinder latent heat storage with/without
gravity and buoyancy, Energy Procedia, 75(2015)
3133-3141.
[5] M.Redzuan, C.N. Saw, H.H. Al-Kayiem, A. Lukmon,
Numerical simulation of PCM integrated solar
collector storage water heater, ARPN Journal of
Engineering and Applied Sciences, 12(2017) 3363-
3367.
[6] J.A. Duffie, W.A. Beckman, Solar energy of thermal
processes, John Wiley and Sons Inc., New
York,2006.
 RESPONSE TO REVIEWS
Review 1:
———– Overall evaluation ———–
1. Add current references so that the current
research gap would be finalized, Except one
reference, all other are before 2015.
Response: Three refernces are added which are
after or on 2015 and highlighted.
2. Validation graph should be included.
Response: Validation graph of experimental and
numerical results are inluded in fig. 8.
3. Format of references should be same.
Response: Appropriate changes have been made.
4. What is the essence of providing Fig.1, if the
description is not available.
Response: Description of Fig. 1 is given and
highlighted.
5. Grid generation part is missing.
Response: Grid generation is disguised as mesh
generation and highlighted.
Review 1:
———– Overall evaluation ———–
Reviewer commeted in his review that authors dealt
with numerical and experimental investigation of bent
tube flat plate solar collector. But auther never
mentioned about the word ‘bend tube’ in this paper.
Since analysis plainly emphasized on the analysis of
flat plate solar water heater.
1. In introduction section, authors mentioned the
sentence “Reference conducted /studied / used” at
many locations. Please rewrite these sentences to
get the flow of work.
Response: These sentence are reduced to greater
extent but kept at few locations wherever
necessary for giving special attention to research
gap.
2. How many collectors considered for the analysis
and how they are configured (In parallel or
series)?
Response: Only one collector is considered for
the analysis so there is no question of
configuration.
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3. Please include the reference wherever the
equations referred. Reference are missing from
equation (3) to (23).
Response: Appropriate changes have been made
and highlighted.(References for equations are
given in subsequent sections introduction.)
4. Reference number given for equation (2) & (3)
are wrong.
Response: Appropriate changes have been made
and highlighted.
5. Why side heat loss coefficients are not
considered in equation (5)?
Response: some equations which are not so
important are ommited due to space
restriction.Hence, authors are not in a position to
answer the question with any conviction.
6. In reality, mass of water is not distributed evenly
in all the riser tubes. How it is accounted in this
study?
Response:This is case of flow in parallel pipe.
For a pipe that branches out into two (or more)
parallel pipes and then rejoins at a junction
downstream, the total flow rate is the sum of the
flow rates in the individual pipes. The pressure
drop (or head loss) in each individual pipe
connected in parallel must be the same since (ΔP
=PA - PB and the junction pressures PA and PB are
the same for all the individual pipes. For a system
of two parallel pipes 1 and 2 between junctions A
and B with negligible minor losses, this can be
expressed as
HL1 = HL2
𝑓𝐿1 𝑉12 𝑓𝐿2 𝑉22
= 2𝑔𝑑1
= 2𝑔𝑑2
This result can be extended to any number of
pipes connected in parallel.
As head loss in each riser tube is same. Hence
velocity in each riser tube is equal. As dia. of
each riser tube is equal, area of riser tubes is
unifrom. Therefore mass of water is not
distributed evenly in all the riser tubes.
7. Please indicate/mention the day of the experiment
conducted.
Response: Appropriate changes have been made
and highlighted.
8. Whether uncertainty analysis are performed to
find out the errors involved in the experiment ? If
yes, please include.
Response: Yes, uncertainity analysis is
performed to find error in experiment. Since
Since the work done was strictly in the interest of
numerical analysis of flat plate collector,
experimental analysis is not explained in
detail.So, uncertainity analysis is not included in
paper due to space restiction.
9. In Figure 7, higher water outlet temperature
observed in simulation compared to experimental
value and in Figure 8, it is reverse. Why?
Response: In Fig. 7, average efficiency of
conventional collector with PCM integrated
collector is compared.So, author finds this
question irrelevant.Hence author is no position to
answer this question with conviction.The reason
behind the gap between numerical than
experimental result in Fig.8 is highlighted.
10. Author should compare the performance of bent
tube collector with straight tube collector. In bent
tube collector, pressure drop should be higher
compared to straight tube collector. Hence, pump
is used (as mentioned in the article) to pump the
fluid to the collector. In such case, power required
for pumping the water should be considered to
calculate the efficiency of the solar system. In
such scenario, bent tube collector may not be
efficient compared to straight tube collector.
Please justify.
Response: Reviewer commeted in his review that
authors dealt with numerical and experimental
investigation of bent tube flat plate solar
collector. But auther never mentioned about the
word ‘bend tube’ in this paper.Since the work
done was strictly in the interest of straight tube
flat plate collector only, the Authors are not in a
position answer the question with any conviction.

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