A Simulation Study of Domestic Hot Water for Flat Plate Solar Collector Using Transient System Simulation Software (TRNSYS)

This paper presents a simulation investigation on the flat plate solar collector by finding out the best performance and the suitable number of collectors. A validation on the performance of the flat plate collectors in Cyprus is carried out. The Transient Systems Simulation (TRNSYS) program simulation is conducted to reduce the experimentation time and avoid high experimental and design cost. The objectives of this project are to obtain the performance of flat plate solar collector by using TRNSYS as well as to determine the suitable number of collectors for domestic hot water in Melaka City by govern by Hottell-Whillier-Bliss equation in TRNSYS. The commercial available flat plate collector was used from MYSOLAR CONCEPT SDN BHD to perform this study. The optimum number of collectors for domestic hot water in Melaka City was determined by using the series 5 MY-60 flat plate collector. The results show that the increase in temperature inlet and the temperature outlet of a solar system will proportionally increase the performance of the flat plate solar collector. The results also show the area of 2.5m2 gives a more optimum temperature output for 78.42%of the whole annual heating load of domestic hot water in Melaka.