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Go to Editorial ManagerAn experimental and theoretical study of free convection heat transfer for a cylinder placed in an iron test section of dimensions (0.2x0.2x0.2 m3), the test section filled with saturated porous material glass balls (5 mm), and the air is the working fluid with Raleigh number (7692.6 ? Ra ? 17654). The circular cylinder heater (D = 0.015 m, L = 0.2 m) is heated electrically, made of Copper and located in different positions (in X & Y direction). The theoretical part includes solving the free convection heat transfer using the ANSYS program (fluent). The experimental and theoretical results showed that the surface temperature values around the cylinder perimeter when changing its position within the test section are changing as moving up and down where the effect of buoyancy force appears. The maximum difference between the upper and lower position at the experimental result is 7.22%, and the average Nusselt number increases with Raleigh number and heat flux. Also, the experimental results showed that the use of porous material significantly improves the heat transfer by 48.6%. The maximum percentage change between the experimental and theoretical results is 5.46%. Moreover, experimental correlations were achieved, and a comparison was performed between the present results with the previous studies and it gives a good agreement.
The experimental analysis is conducted under the Iraqi climate conditions to investigate the performance enhancement of a solar updraft tower system (SUTS) using the porous copper foam as an absorber plate and conventional absorber plate with absorber inclination angle of 18°. In the present work, a semicircular collector is divided into two identical quarter thermal collectors to become two identical SUTS. One of the quarter circular thermal collectors contains on the metal foam as an absorber plate, while the other quarter collector on the conventional flat copper absorber plate. In this study the air inlet height is changed of (3, 5, and 8) cm. The experimental tests carried out in Baghdad city (latitude 33.3° N). Results showed that the air inlet height variation caused to enhance the solar updraft tower performance. The highest values was recorded when the air inlet height is 3 cm using porous absorber compared to flat absorber plate. Copper material foam as an endothermic surface causes a marked decrease in average surface temperature of the plate. The maximum hourly thermal efficiency of solar collector was increased to about 41.6 % and the maximum enhancement of the power output to about 45.2 % compared with flat absorber plate.