Optimization of woven jute/glass fibre-reinforced polyester hybrid composite solar parabolic trough collector

Abstract

In the present work, structural analysis of 5.77m × 4m woven jute (J)/glass (G) fibre-reinforced polyester hybrid composite solar parabolic trough is carried out based on trough parameters to obtain the minimum RMS local slope deviation, termed as SDx value under gravity loading. The optimization is done by varying parameters viz. direction and size of reinforced conduits, stacking number and sequence of hybrid trough laminate at fibre orientation of Δθ=45° and Δθ=60° amongst the layers at 0° collector angle. The analysis revealed that the configuration in which the conduits are placed in both X and Y directions is preferred over other configurations to scale down the effect of wind loads. Furthermore it has been observed that laminate of the order [0°G/45°G/-45°J/90°J]s undergoes minimum surface deformation amongst all the other configurations at conduit reinforcement in both X and Y directions for a conduit thickness of 0.75 mm and radius of 10 mm and obtains the overall SDx value of 1.3492 mrad. The results shows that proposed trough model is very promising and evolves a cost effective system.