On the effectiveness of time and date-based sun positioning solar collector in tropical climate: A case study in Northern Peninsular Malaysia

This paper provides detailed information on the developed hardware and software for sun tracking mechanism and shows the effectiveness of utilizing time and date-based sun positioning solar collector system in tropical climate. The sun positioning system is based on the calculated azimuth and altitude at location E100°11′, N6°26′ in Northern Peninsular Malaysia where the climate is categorized as tropical climate. The system has two axes tracking with accuracy of 1° controlled by a programmable logic controller (PLC). The field test has been done during a sunny and clear day, cloudy day and, heavy overcast and rainy day in which the results show that the improvement in the generated power of 91.97%, 122.71% and 90.42%, respectively, as compared with the fixed horizontal system.