Evaporative cooling of water in a clay-pot refrigerator: experimental study of heat and mass transfer

Abstract This paper describes a quantitative experiment to evaluate the performance of a clay-pot refrigerator which works on the evaporative cooling principle compare the experimental results with predicted values in heat and mass transfer model. The experiment, developed during “Instrumentation for Teaching” classes, was designed to be easily implemented by students that, in addition to performing the tests, made a spreadsheet that models the problem and evaluates the consistency of the results. The model based on a simplified heat and mass transfer is shown to be in good quantitative agreement with the experimental measurements. The experiment, allowing identifying the transfer mechanisms involved in a real physical system, may be employed in the classroom to support the teaching of Physics in this area.