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Simulating freezing and frozen precipitation in an indoor laboratory setting can permit year round evaluation of de/anti-icing systems and fluids. At AMIL, freezing rain, freezing drizzle, icing fog and in-cloud icing as well as frost, snow, ice pellets and icing clouds can be simulated in a variety of cold chambers of different heights and with different wind conditions using specialized spraying systems and temperature set-ups. Freezing rain is simulated using a 9 m high vertical chamber capable of supercooling water droplets from 100 to 1000 μm, so they freeze not long after impact. The freezing drizzle is simulated in a 4 m high chamber where supercooled droplets from 50 to 250 μm freeze on impact. Icing fog and in-cloud icing are simulated with the help of a pneumatic spray nozzle system which allows for a finer water spray, in the 20 μm diameter range. The frost is simulated by saturating a cold room with humidity generated from a heated, temperature controlled water bath.

The certification process for aircraft ground anti-icing fluids involves flat plate wind tunnel aerodynamic flow-off tests. This test method was developed in 1990 from flight and wind tunnel tests results on full scale and model airfoils, and flat plates; the resulting lift losses were then correlated to the Boundary Layer Displacement Thickness (BLDT) on a flat plate. This correlation was made for Type II fluids existing at the time. Since the introduction of Type IV fluids in 1994, with significantly longer anti-icing endurance times, the same test procedure was applied. However, Type IV fluids are generally more viscous than Type II fluids of the same concentration. At the FAA's request, a study was undertaken to see if aerodynamic certification testing should be different for Type IV fluids as opposed to Type II.

Three performance certification tests are required for the assessment of aircraft de/anti-icing fluids. The two first, measuring anti-icing endurance, consists of the Water Spray (WSET) and the High Humidity Endurance Tests (HHET). The third, for aerodynamic performance, consists of the Flat Plate Elimination Test (FPET). The three performance tests, used for both deicing and anti-icing fluids, are described in the annexes of AMS1424 and AMS1428. Since February, 2003 they are covered by aerospace standards AS5900 for aerodynamic, and AS5901 for anti-icing endurance performance. The WSET anti-icing endurance test measures the time that a fluid protects a plate, inclined at a 10° angle, subjected to freezing precipitation, from a specified amount of icing. This WSET time then defines the fluid type: it must exceed 3 minutes for a Type I, 30 minutes for a Type II and 80 minutes for a Type IV fluid.

The objective of this communication is to present the new capability at AMIL in ice accretion simulation on 2D Airfoils at low speed. AMIL, in a joint project with CIRA (Italian Aerospace Research Center), has developed a numerical model called CIRAMIL. This model is able to predict ice shapes in wet and dry regimes. The thermodynamic model used is similar to existing ones. The major difference is in the approach of calculating the surface roughness and the residual, runback and shedding liquid water masses on an airfoil surface. The numerical ice shapes are compared to rime and glaze shapes obtained experimentally in wind tunnel for a NACA0012 wing profile. The new roughness computation method generates the complex ice shapes observed experimentally in wet and dry regimes and the results agree well with icing profiles obtained in wind tunnel experiments and in many cases are better than those predicted by the models available.

Recognition of the need for safe ground aircraft anti-icing products with extended holdover times, and awareness of the related take-off perturbations, have been steadily growing during the 1980's. Standard laboratory testing procedures have been established by regulators to assess both holdover and aerodynamic performances of the commercial anti-icing fluids to be used on airports. Unfortunately, the standard laboratory evaluation procedures do not cover all the conditions encountered in natural cold precipitations which, at times, can vary with respect to the limited conditions simulated in laboratory. Therefore, a research work, on this subject, has been undertaken at the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi (UQAC) with the main objective of identifying the response of deicing and anti-icing fluids under a wide range of icing conditions.