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US 4,392,008 AGranted
Combined electrical and thermal solar collector
AssigneeMonegon, Ltd.
InventorsHerbert M Cullis, Reinhard Stamminger
Life of this patent
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AssigneeMonegon, Ltd.
InventorsHerbert M Cullis, Reinhard Stamminger
Estimating the term…
A solar panel assembly consisting of a shallow rectangular housing with a glass top cover, the housing enclosing a plurality of side-by-side metal plate members with depending longitudinal webs connecting the plate members to longitudinal liquid flow tubes, the plate members, webs and flow tubes being integrally formed by extrusion. Respective enlarged transverse header tubes are connected by coupling sleeves to the opposite ends of the flow tubes, the header tubes extending through and being secured in opposite side walls of the housing, so that the metal plate extrusions are supported in the housing. The plate members are interlocked in coplanar relationship by slidable tongue-and-groove connections at their longitudinal edges. Silicon photovoltaic cells are mounted in row-and-column arrays on the plate members. The depending webs are relatively deep and thin to limit the heat flow rate between the solar plate members and the flow tubes so as to prevent excessive temperature gradients and thermal stresses at the plate areas carrying the silicon cells and to thereby prevent the cells from cracking. The housing contains heat-insulating material which covers the flow tubes and covers the major portions of the header tubes.
A solar panel assembly comprising support means defining an enclosure, flat solar collector plate means mounted in said enclosure, photovoltaic cell means including at least one thin semi-conductor wafer mounted on said plate means, flow tube means in the enclosure below said plate means, thin perpendicularly depending heat-conductive web means rigidly connecting said plate means to said flow tube means and being located immediately subjacent said photovoltaic cell means, respective fluid inlet and outlet header means secured in said enclosure, and means communicatively connecting said inlet and outlet header means to opposite ends of said flow tube means, wherein said flow tube means comprises a plurality of parallel flow tubes below said plate means, wherein said web means comprises respective depending thin heat-conducting perpendicularly depending webs connecting said plate means to said flow tubes, and wherein said photovoltaic cell means includes a plurality of photovoltaic silicon semi-conductor wafers mounted on the plate means immediately adjacent to and substantially centered above the locations of said heat-conducting webs.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.