The use of an artificial roughness on a surface is an effective technique to enhance the rate of heat transfer to fluid flow in the duct of a solar air heater. This paper presents a comparison of effective efficiency of solar air heaters having different types of geometry of roughness elements on the absorber plate. The effective efficiency has been computed by using the correlations for heat transfer and friction factor developed by various investigators within the investigated range of operating and system parameters. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.