Three Dimensional CFD Simulation Model with Experimental Validation of Silica Gel–Water Pair Adsorption Cooling Bed

Abstract

In this paper, a three-dimensional full simulation model of a solar-driven adsorption cooling system integrated with user-defined functions (UDF) is successfully validated with a manufactured adsorption chamber filled with silica-gel type A. model is validated on the desorption phase with a maximum deviation error of 1.7%. Temperature with adsorption contours are shown for more understanding of the heat flow with adsorption behaviour inside the chamber in all directions. The maximum temperature at the desorption phase is reached after 300 seconds at fins area, and adsorption maximum uptake reached 0.16 kg/kg at fins wall but reached from 0.13 to 0.14 kg/kg around fins area. The average adsorption uptake reached 0.136 at the end of the adsorption process. The resultant uptake between adsorption and desorption is 0.018 kg/kg with a refrigerant mass of 1.8 kg in a complete cycle time.