The Austrian Institute for Icing Sciences portfolio is designed to complement icing wind tunnel tests and increases the value of testing remarkably by providing unique and additional insights.
The icing tests are generally performed at the test facility preferred by the client. The 3D scan systems of AIIS are mobile and are transported and set-up at the selected test facility. AIIS performs accurate 3D measurements of the ice accretion on the test object to document each test run during an icing campaign.
In the next step, the generated data is evaluated and analyzed with IceLab to provide valuable insights about the ice shapes. Moreover, the 3D data of the documented ice shapes are used to manufacture artificial ice shapes. AIIS has developed IceFoil, a unique method to manufacture semiflexible ice shapes. IceFoil has comparable aerodynamic characteristics to real ice and can be utilized for validation in dry wind tunnel tests and flight tests. Additionally, CFD simulations can be performed with IceSim to compare and verify the aerodynamic effects of different ice accretions. The obtained results help to streamline and speed up the R&D process and can be used to demonstrate the capabilities of ice protection systems to the authority.