Composite metal technology was Used to manufacture intermetallic compound (IC) absorption surfaces and to combine them integrally with composite metal tube-in-sheet collector plates. Five material systems, in which Al was one component metal and Fe, Cr or Ni or their alloy was the other pair, were evaluated. All intermetallic compounds had high solar absorptance a = 0.9. The AlNi was mo.Bt promising and a 0.95 and e -0.3 were obtained over a broad range of compounding conditions. After eight months exposure in flat plate collector enclosure the characteristic properties 9% A Ni surfaces remained ..LS.