The performance of an absorber is of paramount importance when considering the overall performance of an absorption-cycle heat pump. Thus, a thorough understanding of the absorption process and a means of predicting the performance of an absorber are useful. For these reasons, a model of the absorption process in a simple absorber, using lithium-bromide and water as the working fluids, was developed. Subsequently, the model was applied to a particular absorber through the use of a computer program. Using this program, the effect an absorber performance due to the variance of several parameters was analysed. The results of the absorber performance simulations are also presented.

KEYWORDS: calculating, performance, absorption heat pumps, absorbers, lithium bromide, water, computer programs, thermal resistance, heat flow, properties, fluid flow, flow rate, vapour pressure, heat load, heat transfer fluids, refrigerants, heat transfer coefficient