Experimental investigation of simulated large-droplet ice shapes on airfoil aerodynamics

An experimental investigation was conducted to study the aerodynamic effect of simulated supercooled large-droplet ice accretion on a modified NACA 23 012 airfoil, Forward-facing quarter-round simulations with height-to-chord ratios of 0.0083 and 0.0139 were used at a Reynolds number of 1.8 x 10(6). When the simulated ice,vas placed at critical chordwise locations, a long s eparation bubble formed downstream of the simulated ice shape and effective ly eliminated the formation of a large leading-edge suction peak that was o bserved on the clean NACA 23012 airfoil, This resulted in a dramatic reduct ion in the maximum lift coefficient, as low as 0.27, when the larger simula ted ice shape was located at 12% chord, Because the airfoil loading distrib ution was severely altered, large changes in airfoil pitching moments and f lap-hinge moments were also observed.