Abstract: In order to further improve the performance of the air-source heat pump fire hose drying device, a heat pump drying system with heat recovery was designed on the basis of the conventional closed heat pump drying system. The drying characteristics of the fire hose were analysed using an test comparison method, and the SMER, MER, coefficient of performance (COP), heat production, compressor energy consumption, fan energy consumption, and total energy consumption of the system were compared between the heat-recovery heat pump drying system and the conventional closed-type heat pump drying system at different air supply temperatures and speeds. The results showed that the SMER of the drying system increased by 12.7% to 21.4%, the MER increased by 7.1% to 15.1%, and the total energy consumption of the system decreased by 11.3% to 17.6% with the use of the heat recovery unit. Therefore, the use of heat recovery device will improve the performance of fire hose drying system.

Key words: heat pump drying, heat recovery, drying characteristics, performance analysis, fire hose