Analysis and performance of radial flow rotary desiccant dehumidifiers

A model is developed to predict the steady periodic performance of a radial flow desiccant wheel. The model is expressed in terms of the same dimensionless parameters that are commonly used in modeling of the conventional axial flow desiccant wheel. In addition a dimensionless geometrical ratio of the volume of the matrix to the volume of the wheel core is found to affect the performance of the wheel. A finite difference technique on staggered grid is used to discretize the governing dimensionless equations. The discretized equations are solved to predict the performance of the desiccant wheel at given values of operation parameters. A sensitivity study is carried out to investigate the effect of changing any of these parameters on the performance of the wheel. The performance of the radial flow desiccant wheel is compared with that of the convential axial flow desiccant wheel having the same values of the operation parameters.