Computational Investigation of Icing Conditions on The Velocity Profiles of a Commercial Aircraft

Icing is a challenging problem in the aerospace environment especially for inter-continental airline operations. Existing anti-icing methods offer consistent performance against glaze icing problems however it compromises the fuel efficiency through by-pass bleed air. A Numerical analysis for an airfoil with and without icing conditions is done to investigate the velocity distribution around the commercial airplane wing. The supercritical airfoil is analyzed in step by step ice accretion aspect under optimal velocity input about 175 m/s. The surrounding temperature is maintained in the range of 273K to 243K as per FAR standards at various angles of attack. The airfoil is designed by DESIGN MODELER module exists in ANSYS workbench and it is meshed with ICEMCFD. Subsequently, it is analyzed with the help of a flow solver at various time steps of ice accretion to verify the dynamic pressure changes due to rime icing. The iced airfoil produced realistic CL and CD variations for different ice shapes against the clean wing configuration. The step by step ice accretion is summarized and the roadmap for ice elimination through coating techniques is proposed.