Numerical investigation of airfoil ice accumulation: Ice shape and ice crack propagation

Abstract

For aircraft ice accumulation, this paper analyzed airfoil icing with OpenFOAM software, including the ice shape analysis, ice crack propagation analysis and ice stress intensity analysis. The direction of water overflow is divided along the chordwise and spanwise of the airfoil. And the heat and mass transfer process of icing is investigated by modifying the classical Messinger icing thermodynamic model. Based on the traditional calculation method of 2D surface heat transfer coefficient, an improved 3D airfoil surface heat transfer coefficient calculation method is proposed. And ice accretion is along the direction normal to the surface. The model of airfoil ice shape and crack growth was established by the self-developed C-DEICE program. The flow field of the 2D and 3D ice shape obtained by reverse modeling were calculated by the C-DEICE program. The crack propagation and ice shedding shape were simulated in 2D and 3D. Icing completely changes the pressure distribution on the airfoil surface, and the aerodynamic performance is decreased by 91.6%. The displacement of ice body above the crack increases significantly with the crack propagation, and the displacement increases with the distance from the crack tip, which is consistent with the 2D crack propagation simulation results. Furthermore, the self-developed C-DEICE program can better capture the trend of ice shape and the range of ice covering on the airfoil surface. It is found that the fluid–solid coupling method is reliable for determining the initial crack location. Meanwhile, it also lays a theoretical foundation for the follow-up study of ice shedding trajectory.