Analysis of various designs of a desiccant wheel for improving the performance using a mathematical model

A mathematical model for predicting the performance of a desiccant wheel with various wheel designs has been used by considering heat and mass transfer for both moist air and the desiccant material. The model shows good agreement with experimental data. An experimental setup was fabricated using an evacuated tube solar air collector with a desiccant wheel. The hot air needed for regeneration is produced by the evacuated tube solar air collector, which has a collector surface area of 4.44 m2. The regeneration can be started from 40 ° C . The temperature of outlet air obtained is in the range of 40–65 ° C in this evacuated tube solar air collector. The experimental setup was installed at NIT Kurukshetra, India, 29° 58′ (latitude) North and 76° 53′ (longitude) East. This model is used to compare the performance of two sector and four sector desiccant wheels and found that the maximum moisture removal efficiency of both two sector and four sector is same but in the two sector, it is obtained at twice the rph of a four sector. This model is also used to analyze the performance of two sectors with heated and cooled purge at different regeneration temperature and found that the desiccant system with a higher purge angle and lower regeneration angle performs better at low rph as compared to a lower purge angle and higher regeneration angle.