Comparative Analysis of the Effect of Floor Types and Size Variation on the Performance of Solar Dryer

This research paper present the comparative analysis of four solar dryers with different size and floor types. The solar dryers were used to perform an experiment, the following parameters were read and record for the period of the experiment: temperature, relative humidity and energy. The results of the solar dryers shows that black ceramic floor has higher efficiency compared to white ceramic floor and sandy floor. The hourly variation of temperature inside the dryers was much higher with black ceramic floor compared to white ceramic floor and sandy floor. The solar dryers was observed to have higher energy in black ceramic floor compared to the white ceramic floor and sandy floor. The relative humidity inside the dryer was relatively low in the black floor dryer compared to that of the white ceramic floor and sandy floor. The results of the experiment also shows the effect of size on the solar dryers, when exposed to sunshine it was observed that, the B6 solar dryer gives the highest performance, and the highest temperature recorded inside the dryer was 70°C. At this temperature, the performance efficiency of the B6 dryer was 67%. For B4 solar dryer the highest temperature was 65°C with efficiency of 59% and B3 solar dryer has a temperature of 62°C and an efficiency of 51%. It was also observed that B2 solar dryer which is the smallest among them has a temperature of 58°C and an efficiency of 41.5%.