Now a day, plenty of hot water is used for domestic, commercial and industrial purposes. Various resources i.e. coal, diesel, gas etc, are used to heat water and sometimes for steam production. Solar energy is the main alternative to replace the conventional energy sources. There are various types of solar water heater system available in the commercial market to fulfill different customers demand, such as flat plate collector, concentrating collector, evacuated tube collector and integrated collector storage. A cost effective cum easy fabricated V-trough solar water heater system using forced circulation system is proposed. Integrating the solar absorber with the easily fabricated V-trough reflector can improve the performance of solar water heater system. In this paper, experiments on the efficiency were conducted for a week during which the atmospheric conditions were almost uniform and data was collected from the collector. The experimental result has shown very promising results in both thermal efficiency of V-trough reflector & parabolic solar water heater.

1. Journal for Research | Volume 03| Issue 02 | April 2017
ISSN: 2395-7549
All rights reserved by www.journal4research.org 58
An Experimental Investigation on Stationary V
Trough & Parabolic Solar Water Collector
P.L.Navaneethakrishnan Bibin P Mathew
Assistant Professor UG Student
Department of Mechanical Engineering Department of Mechanical Engineering
Adithya Institute of Technology,Coimbatore Adithya Institute of Technology, Coimbatore
Liju joseph Muhammed mashood T
UG Student UG Student
Department of Mechanical Engineering Department of Mechanical Engineering
Adithya Institute of Technology, Coimbatore Adithya Institute of Technology, Coimbatore
Musfar P
UG Student
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Adithya Institute of Technology, Coimbatore
Abstract
Now a day, plenty of hot water is used for domestic, commercial and industrial purposes. Various resources i.e. coal, diesel, gas
etc, are used to heat water and sometimes for steam production. Solar energy is the main alternative to replace the conventional
energy sources. There are various types of solar water heater system available in the commercial market to fulfill different
customers demand, such as flat plate collector, concentrating collector, evacuated tube collector and integrated collector storage.
A cost effective cum easy fabricated V-trough solar water heater system using forced circulation system is proposed. Integrating
the solar absorber with the easily fabricated V-trough reflector can improve the performance of solar water heater system. In this
paper, experiments on the efficiency were conducted for a week during which the atmospheric conditions were almost uniform
and data was collected from the collector. The experimental result has shown very promising results in both thermal efficiency of
V-trough reflector & parabolic solar water heater.
Keywords: Forced circulation system, Global solar radiation, Parabolic solar water heater, Thermal efficiency, V-trough
solar water heater
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________
I. INTRODUCTION
Energy resources are classified as two types: renewable resources, including solar energy, wind power, hydraulic energy,
geothermal energy and biomass energy, and non-renewable resources that cannot be restocked, such as petrol, nuclear energy,
coal and natural gas. The world’s energy usage from non-renewable properties adds up to 91.88% while 8.12% of the energy is
produced from renewable resources .Research involving inexpensive and fresh sources of energy such as solar energy, recently
the use with solar energy for electricity generation, air conditioning and water heating has grown-up. In the domestic
applications, households consume energy by using air conditioning, heating, water heating, lighting and other uses.
The aim of the project is to utilize the renewable energy unused in a large amount. One of the most important renewable-energy
resources is the solar energy which sun emits to the earth. The solar energy can be utilized to a higher amount in areas having
tough climatic conditions like India. The sun emits solar radiation as much as 1395 W/m2 to consume this energy solar collector
is used. The most financial and efficient solar collector is the flat plate collector which absorbs solar radiation, and the heat is
conveyed over the water inside the tubes of the collector. The performance of the solar water heater is increased by several
augmentation techniques like absorber plate coating, glazing glass types and thermal insulation etc. Lot researches are being
carried out for increasing the thermal performance of heat exchanger. Yet there are still few research works to be carried out to
increase the thermal performance in solar water heater. The novelty of our work is to couple a V-trough reflector to the solar
absorber to increase the thermal efficiency of the system & compare with the parabolic solar water heater.
II. FABRICATION & EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
Solar water heater is used from past decades but in this study effect of V-through, a flat plate collector water storage system on
productivity of a solar water heater will be analyzed, that’s why a V-through the flat plate collector water storage system will be
selected for study. Figure 1 shows the solar water heater.

2. An Experimental Investigation on Stationary V Trough & Parabolic Solar Water Collector
(J4R/ Volume 03 / Issue 02 / 010)
All rights reserved by www.journal4research.org 59
Fig. 1: Experimental Setup
1) cold water tank
2) pipes
3) hot water tank
4) evacuated tubes
5) metal sheets
Working principle of solar water heater
Operation as it consists of a unit with dual operation, to absorb solar radiation and to preserve the solar heat, instead of the
absorbing solar radiation and the heating only of the circulating fluid. When solar radiation from the sun is absorbed by the
blackened absorber plate, it is changed to heat. The heat is shifted to the flow tubes by conduction. The water through the flow
tubes is in turn heated by the convection process between the tubes and the water grains. The heated water becomes warmer and
less dense than the water in the storing tank. These density difference results in flexibility force, often referred to as the
thermosyphon head which makes a continuous convective movement of water from the bottom of the tank to the bottom of the
collector, up through the collector flow tubes, and back into the top of the tank.
V-trough collector
Similar to other type of forced circulation system, the novel V-trough SWH system mainly consists of stationary V-trough
collector, pump circulation system and storage tank. The proposed V-trough SWH with high thermal efficiency can be easily
constructed and installed in the rural area without the requirement of sophisticated equipment.
The prototype of V-trough SWH system was constructed in the Adithya institute of technology campus that is located at
Coimbatore with latitude 11.1134° N and longitude of 77.0364° E. In this system, the stationary V-trough collector was designed
to concentrate the sunlight onto the absorber in order to effectively convert solar energy into thermal energy. The following
describe the details of each component of the prototype V-trough SWH system and how these components were constructed.
The solar collector is made from two major parts: a flat absorber plate and V-trough reflector. The V-trough reflector was
constructed using two rectangular face SS304 reflectors with a dimension of 150mm (width) X 2000 mm (length) X5 mm
(thickness) each and inclined at the angle of 60° relative to the absorber plate. To optimize the optical performance, the V-trough
reflector was aligned horizontally along east-west direction. Ideally the V-trough reflector should be south facing and inclined at
the angle of equal to the local latitude. However, in order to simplify the mechanical structure of the prototype with a very
minimum effect to the overall performance, we decided to place the V-trough reflector in horizontal since the local latitude is
only 11° N.

3. An Experimental Investigation on Stationary V Trough & Parabolic Solar Water Collector
(J4R/ Volume 03 / Issue 02 / 010)
All rights reserved by www.journal4research.org 60
Fig. 2: Experimental Setup
III. RESULT AND DISSECTION
Measurements of the incident solar radiation and other system parameters were carried out at intervals of one hour from 9:00
A.M to 16:00 P.M every day. Graph 1-4 show the daily average values of three temperature of various points and global solar
radiation from 6 March 2017 to 9March 2017 between the time intervals of 9:00 am to 16:00 pm.
The observations of the 50 L capacity of the water tank and 5 L water continuously removed from the storage tank at one-hour
interval period. Temperature measurement of the set up was carried out for full day during whole study. Reflectors (SS304) are
used to improve thermal efficiency of V- through solar water collectors.
Observations during Experiment
In this study, different observations are noted. All readings are surmised in a graphical form with necessary data. Nomenclatures
are shown, used in the observation's tables:
 I Solar radiation - W/m²
 T1 Temperature of inlet to ETC of o
C
 T2 Temperature of outside the setup (after ETC tube) o
C
 T3 Ambient Temperature o
C
Thermal Analysis of Solar water heater
In this section temperature measurements were done at various locations of experimental setup. And show these measurements in
graphs for all experiments conditions. K-Type thermocouples are used for temperature recordings at 3 locations in Experimental
Set-Up.

4. An Experimental Investigation on Stationary V Trough & Parabolic Solar Water Collector
(J4R/ Volume 03 / Issue 02 / 010)
All rights reserved by www.journal4research.org 61
Trough solar water collector:
Fig. 3: three temperature of various points on 6th & 7th March 2017 between the time intervals of 9:00 am to 16:00 pm
Fig. 4: global solar radiation & efficiency on 6th & 7th March 2017 between the time intervals of 9:00 am to 16:00 pm
Parabolic solar water collector:
Fig. 5: three temperature of various points on 8th & 9th March 2017 between the time intervals of 9:00 am to 16:00 pm
Fig. 6: global solar radiation & efficiency on 8th & 9th March 2017 between the time intervals of 9:00 am to 16:00 pm
IV. CONCLUSION
 This project is giving the idea for developing the solar water heater without using the electric power and other resources, To
understanding the efficiency comparison of V trough and parabolic collector.

5. An Experimental Investigation on Stationary V Trough & Parabolic Solar Water Collector
(J4R/ Volume 03 / Issue 02 / 010)
All rights reserved by www.journal4research.org 62
 Finally the result is more efficiency are V trough when compared to parabolic collector.
 The project is investigated the material properties are described and heat absorbing capacity of various material are refer.
 The project is developed at very easily at simple construction and low cost product.
REFERENCES
[1] Himanshu Pandya & Arun Kumar Behura, “Experimental Study of V-Through Solar Water Heater for Tilt Angle and Glass Transmissivity” International
Conference on Recent Advancement in Air Conditioning and Refrigeration, RAAR 2016, 10-12 November 2016
[2] Chong KK, Chay KG, Chin KH. Study of a solar water heater using stationary V-trough collector. Renewable Energy 2012; 39, 207-215.
[3] Jaisankar S, Ananth J, Thulasi S, Jayasuthakar ST, Sheeba KN. A comprehensive review on solar water heaters. Renewable and sustainable Energy
Reviews 2011; 15, 3045–3050.
[4] Deng Yuechao, Zhao Yaohua, Quan Zhenhua, Zhua Tingting. Experimental study of the thermal performance for the novel flat plate solar water heater with
micro heat pipe array absorber. Energy Procedia 2015; 70, 41–48.
[5] Zhu Ting-ting, Zhao Yao-hua, Diao Yan-hua, Li Feng-fei, Deng Yue-chao. Experimental investigation on the performance of a novel solar air heater based
on flat micro-heat pipe arrays (FMHPA). Energy Procedia 2015; 70,146 –154
[6] Llorente García, I., Álvarez, J.L., Blanco, D. Performance model for parabolic trough solar thermal power plants with thermal storage: Comparison to
operating plant data. Solar Energy 2011;85(10):2443-2460.
[7] Grigorios Iordanou ―Flat-Plate Solar Collectors for Water Heating with Improved Heat Transfer for Application in Climatic Conditions of the
Mediterranean Region‖ Durham University 2009.
[8] Zarza, E, Valenzuela, L., León, J., Hennecke, K., Eck, M., Weyers, H.-D., & Eickhoff, M. Direct steam generation in parabolic troughs: Final results and
conclusions of the DISS project. Energy 29. 2004.
[9] Maryam Shafahi and Vincenzo Binaco ,"Thermal Performance of Flat-Shaped Heat pipes using nanofluids", International Journal of Heat and Mass
Transfer, 53 (2010)1438-1445.