Design and Construction of a Solar Flat Collector for Social Housing in México

Abstract In this work, the design, construction and instantaneous efficiency in solar water heater were investigated. A thermal analysis was developed, based on the energy balanced in the solar collector. The geometry and dimension in the collector was determinate by the results of the thermal analysis and the thermal properties of the materials used for the collector construction. The dimension of solar collector was of 1.4 m 2 with a storage tank of 100 L. The highest temperature reached was 55.0 o C and decreased to 47.6 o C during the night. The flow rate was at range from 0.0038-0.04 kg/s, and the global average efficiency was of 30.2%.