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An experimental study is conducted to investigate the performance of a solely solar drying system and a system equipped with an auxiliary heater as a supplement to the solar heat. The performances of both are compared to that of natural drying. Beans and peas are dehydrated in a system that consists of two flat plate collectors, a blower, and a drying chamber. Tests with four different airflow rates, namely, 0.0383, 0.05104, 0.0638, and 0.07655 m 3 /s are conducted. It was found that the drying time was reduced from 56 hours for natural drying to 12-14 hours for solar drying and to 8-9 hours for mixed (solar and auxiliary) drying. The efficiency of the mixed drying system was found to increase by 25% to 40% compared to the solely solar drying. A best fit to the experimental data of peas and beans was obtained by six exponential equations for the various systems with a correlation coefficient in the range 0.933 and 0.997.

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Abstract— Silica gel is a substance commonly used in desiccant wheel, which in turn is used in many applications to reduce moisture from the supplied air to a specific space. In this research,  the effect of different operational conditions on the performance of silica gel wheel were studied. The desiccant wheel, which has been used, has a diameter of 55 cm and thickness of 20 cm. It contains 34 kg of silica gel and rotate at a speed of 30 rph. The theoretical performance coefficients of the desiccant wheel which have been studied include ,moisture removal capacity(MRC),dehumidification performance(DCOP),latent coefficient of performance (COPlat), and desiccant wheel effectiveness(ϵ_d). The theoretical investigation of these coefficients was done by using Novel Aire Technology software program (Simulation program of desiccant wheel) (2012). While the operational conditions like process air (humid air)inlet temperature between(30 to 43.4)0C, process air inlet humidity ratio between (0.011 to 0.019)kg/kgdry air ,regeneration air inlet temperature between (56.5 to 70)0C,and process air mass flow rate between(0.0814 to 0.199)kg/s. The results shows that the effectiveness and the moisture removal capacity have the same behavior increase with the increasing in mass flow rate from(0.0814 to 0.199) kg/s, humidity ratio from(11 to19)g/kgdry air, and regeneration air temperature from(56 t0 70)oC. But they reduces with increasing of inlet process air temperature from(30 to43.4)oC..