Iced Airfoil Separation Bubble Measurements by Particle Image Velocimetry

Not long after the birth of aviation, pilots began to recognize the dangers posed by aircraft icing. Since that time, research has improved the awareness of this problem and the scientific understanding of the associated aerodynamic impacts, however, few studies have involved detailed, quantitative, flowfield measurements. For this reason, the current investigation was conducted in which high spatial-resolution flowfield measurements were acquired of a NACA 0012 airfoil with two- and three-dimensional, simulated, leading-edge, horn-ice accretions utilizing particle image velocimetry (PIV). These measurements complemented existing iced airfoil performance measurements, revealed previously unknown details regarding the structure and behavior of these flowfields, and could potentially facilitate the development and improvement of computational schemes used to predict largely separated flows, including that of an iced airfoil near stall.