Design and development of an automated absorption calorimeter system
Abstract
A microcomputer controlled absorption calorimeter
has been designed and constructed for data acquisition
in solar energy conversion measurements and tested by
taking measurements on surfaces of specimens of
selected metals; copper and aluminium. The BBC
microcomputer with its versatile interface ports has
been used. The instrument has been tested by
determining the heating and cooling curves of the
surfaces of samples prepared from the materials that
can potentially be used for constructing solar
collector plates. From the measurements, the radiation
absorption characteristics of the surfaces can be
qualitatively deduced. The absorptances of two of the
metals used: copper and aluminium coated with soot have
been determined based on values of absorptance of the
pure metals obtained from literature. The values
calculated using intervals of temperature from
different parts of the graphs have been found to be
• constant, which is in agreement with the fact that the
absorptance is a constant.
Citation
MSc.Sponsorhip
University of NairobiPublisher
University of Nairobi Faculty of Science