Paper ID: 201 Name of Field of Work: Electrical and Electronic Engineering

Proceedings of the
Conference on Engineering Research, Innovation and Education 2011
CERIE 2011, 11-13 January 2011, Sylhet, Bangladesh

DEICING TECHNOLOGY FOR MODERN MILITARY AND

COMMERCIAL AIRCRAFT WING SUFRACES
Shuza Binzaid1*, Shamshul A. Al-Tomal2, Dara Zaid3,
Mahamudul H. Rosen4
1
Founder and Director, SERES-BD, Dhaka, Bangladesh
2
Department of Mechanical Engineering
University of Texas at San Antonio, Texas, USA
3
Department of Civil Engineering
University of Bangladesh, Dhaka, Bangladesh
4
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
University of Information Technology and Sciences

An airplane wing ice detector has been designed and found to have some extra advantages over many
commercially available snow/ice detectors on airplane wings. The system has been tested extensively and
has proved to be accurate and reliable. A new type of graphite sensor has been designed which is self-
cleaning, very low power, easily mountable and replaceable. This graphite sensor is implemented in the
system to detect the presence of ice and measure ice thickness accurately. A comparative discussion of this
system with some of the commercial systems will be presented in this paper. A novel technique using DSP-
based real-time application of the system will be discussed in this paper. This paper discusses about better
safety to both modern military and commercial aircrafts and the advancements of the future technology.

Key words: Sensor; DSP; Real-Time Application; Differential Amplifier, Threshold Detection

1. INTRODUCTION those systems [3]. Some systems employ

Water particles from atmosphere deposit as ice on
aircraft wing surfaces at lower altitude below 25000
feet during operation of an aircraft in flight. Thus it
makes the military missions imperative to achieve
effective flight mission. Also for commercial
aircraft’s safety requires knowing risk of icing
condition to avoid catastrophic situation. For
aircraft in the take-off mode, the FAA has ruled
that no ice is to be present on critical flight surfaces
[1]. Recent study has shown that ice roughness
heights of as little as 0.005 inches can reduce
maximum lift capability by 20% and roughness of
0.03 inches will decrease lift by 40% [2]. Such
tremendous degradation of aerodynamic efficiency
occurs as a result of ice accumulation with possible
consequences of stalling, problem of drag and loss
in performance to the airplane. As a vital part of
flight safety, the flight crew must be informed of
ice and icing conditions.
Technical literatures about ice detection and
information of commercially available deicing
systems have been reviewed to understand
functionality, advantages and disadvantages of
mechanical apparatus such as cylinders to collect
ice, with light path sensing, vibration or resonance
variation, stiffness sensing, hot rod for specific heat
sensing etc. These systems have some limitations.
An airplane wing ice detector/deicing system has
been designed and found to have some extra
advantages over many commercially available
snow/ice detectors placed on airplane wing surfaces
[4]. In this paper we describe a new design of an
ultra low-power, easily replaceable graphite sensor
which is self-cleaning, thus making the sensor
virtually maintenance free. A larger model of this
graphite sensor has been tested extensively. It has
proved to be very accurate and reliable to detect the
presence of ice and measure the ice thickness.
2. SYSTEM DESIGN
An amplifier consisting two op-amp circuits is
designed to process very low power signal
information from sensors. The dangerous level of
icing condition is detected with the processed signal
voltage that is proportional to ice thickness by TI
DSP system (TMS3206711 DSK). A computer
setup with DSP system simulates and computes the

*
Corresponding Author: Shuza Binzaid, PhD,
E-mail: shuza00@yahoo.com
actual thickness of ice detected on the sensor. The
system requires calibration only once at amplifier
stages during initial setup of DSP for signal capture
and thus digital conversion of ice-thickness that
becomes proportional to resistance of the sensor.
As a part of calibration, the computer also
calculates the multiplier factors for sensor values.
Figure 1 shows the block diagram of system setup.
Ice and
Temperature Signal Amplifier
Sensors on Wing Stages
TI DSP
TMS3206711 DSK
System
Fig 1: Block diagram of the system
The ice sensor should be placed on upper front
surface of the airplane wing at airflow transition
area where ice buildup occurs. This area is very
important for airplane lift factor. Any roughness on
this area can cause loss of flight efficiency. Such
loss of flight efficiency results in turbulence and
drag thus flight safety degrades tremendously. The
sensors are placed along the path of airflow in
parallel thus there is no issue of airlift due to the
sensor placement. Also this placement can maintain
minimum force on the sensor caused by airflow.
This system also needs a temperature monitoring
capabilities. The temperature sensor allows system
to detect lower temperature for ice buildup
conditions only. Thus preventing any false
detection of water accumulation i.e. rain drops on ie
sensor or wing surface of airplane while on ground.
Figure 2 shows the deicing system sensors placed
on the aircraft wing surface. The transition area is
indicated by ice buildup region.
Ice Sensor Aircraft Wing Turbulence
Ice buildup Temperature Sensor
region
Fig 2: Sensors on aircraft wing surface
3. BASIC PRINCIPALES OF THE
SENSOR
The sensor unit uses two probes that are electrically
conductive using a very low current ranging
between few micro amps only at low voltage. These
probes are non-corrosive by environmental effects
on the wing surface. The resistive medium at steady
state condition is considered as air. In this
condition, sensor read the resistance of air was
about 4 M. Figure 3 represents the equivalent
electrical circuit diagram for initial test setup of
sensor. The resistance of the sensor drops to about
20 K, when probes conduct through water making
about 0.01-inch thick film.
In this deicing application, the sensor is very small
in size. The detection process occurs by water
particles between the probes creating a low current
path. Water particles at very low temperature freeze
and thus the aerodynamic quality of an airplane
wing degrades. Also it creates a similar current path
between the sensor probes. It continues with low
current path between probes until the ice is melted
away and break the path.
Sensor Probe
R protection
V supply
supply V sense R sensor
R reference
Sensor Probe
Fig 3: An equivalent sensor circuit.
This small sensor can detect only a localized area
where detection is important. The size of the sensor
probes can be made longer for different aerospace
applications where continuous detection process is
required for distributed area. There are three
resistors associated with this circuit. Rprotection is
used to prevent the system from short circuit
situations. Value of the resistor is about 200  and
it can easily be ignored for calculation, as the other
resistance values are so large. Vsense is measured
when Vsupply value is non-zero. A shunt resistor
with value above 3 M can be placed in parallel
with Virtual Rsesnsor for checking sensor’s proper
connection as an option. This resistance value can
be ignored also as the ice detection resistance is
much lower than this value. This circuit in figure 3
forms a potential divider network and the resistance
of the sensor can be expressed as:
Rsensor = (Rref*Vsense)/(Vsupply-Vsense)
The logical conditions are determined from the
equivalent circuit of the sensor. Table 1 determines
these conditions. The threshold can be adjusted
within a very wide range of sensed medium from
Table 1: Condition of monitored zone
Rsensor Logical
Resistance Condition
< 2 K Sensor line short circuit
< 30 K (Ice Ice detected
threshold adjustable)
>30 K and <2.5 M No ice detected
> 2.5 M Sensor open circuit
30 K to 2.5 M. So this type of sensor can be
used to determine presence of non-icing conditions
also. The Rsensor values are changed when in the
presence of ice from very high values of air
resistance to few thousand times smaller values of
water resistance.
This small width is adequate as the critical
thickness for the presence of ice is very small
during flight. Also the sensing threshold stays
within the smaller voltage range.
Increasing the length of probes can increase
accuracy of ice thickness measurement. The Csensor
is negligible for deicing application, as the length of
probes is very small to create air-gap capacitance.
In most cases this capacitance can be ignored if
only to detect ice.
Cref is an optional capacitor used in parallel in order
to help stabilizing the DC effect of the Rref in the
circuit. This circuit used high frequency input
signal to the sensor.
The input high frequency applied to the sensor
prevents ionized contaminants to attach on the
surface of the sensor probes. The polarity of the
probes switch at the same rate of the input
frequency and ionized contaminants are always
repelled thus the sensor maintenance is reduced and
also longer life of this sensor can be obtained.
The localized sensor data showed linearity of the
curve in figure 5. This linearity also determines that
the capacitance between the probes is negligible.
Localized Sensor Curve
7.5

4. EXPERIMTATION AND RESULTS

Sensor Circuit Output Voltage

6.5

Figure 4 shows the actual circuit implemented and 5.5

tested. The sensor had about 0.9 inches long and
0.1 inches wide graphite probes. It was used to 4.5
detect water and ice.
3.5

2.5
Rprotection
1.5
-1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
V Rref Ice Thickness (Unit = 0.05 Inch)
Csensor
Cref Rsensor
Figure 5: Plot of data from the localized sensor
system shows voltage linearity with ice thickness.
Signal
Signal Differential
Differentia The threshold shift at amplifier output was from
Amplifier
Amplifier l Amplifier
Amplifier S
e
1.94 volts to 6.12 volts in localized sensor as
n expected. The detection of ice was done easily with
s this threshold variation. The linear curve shows the
DSP System Threshold o linearity of ice resistance with thickness. Then the
Detection r slope of the curve was determined from collected
data. With the amplifier and the sensor setup, the
experiment results showed that 12.267 mV of
threshold changed for every 0.01 inches of ice
Fig 4: A practical sensor and circuit system. thickness.
5. ADVANTAGES AND DIS- The electronic circuit was designed for sensor
ADVANTAGES signal amplification. A logical operation flow for
the system was implemented for ice detection and
There are a number of advantages of this sensor and deicing actions. Figure 6 represents the logical flow
circuit setup over some other sensors found on of the system operation.
aircraft. They are:
1. The design is very practical and sensor can be
easily placed on wing surface. Then the circuit
can be easily adjusted and calibrated for steady Start
state condition.
System
2. The system is associated with temperature
Initialize
sensing capabilities increase system accuracy to
determine presence of ice.
Wing
No
3. This sensor can be driven at high frequency with Surface Temp
a very low current rectification circuit. T<0 ?

4. The system has built-in short-circuit protection Yes

where electrical burnout does not occur and thus
Activate
safety is increased.
Ice Sensor Input
Signal
5. The sensor probes are capable of self- cleaning
and removes ionized contaminants increasing
life of sensor and making it maintenance-free.
Ice
Present on No
6. In continuous distribution sensor setup, the
Sensor?
sensor probes can be connected in series to
increase the coverage of sensing length or area
on aircraft surface. Yes

7. A number of ice sensors can be connected in Detect for Critical DSP

parallel to a single sensing node of network to Threshold of Ice Measure Ice
increase the number of sensing zones. Thickness Thickness

There are some disadvantages of the system that

can also be avoided carefully: Interrupt
Deicing System
1. Steady state conditions need to be recalibrated if to Activate
numbers of sensors are changed.
Ice
2. Graphite sensors in this system were brittle Yes Present on
under pressure. Other conductive, non-corrosive Sensor?
materials may need to be identified.
No
3. Increasing the sensor length reduces value of
Rsensor and increases value of Csensor and thus
increasing non-linear function of ice thickness.
Fig 6: The logical flow of the system operation
6. THE SYSTEM OPERATION
When temperature is above the icing condition, the
The system has been tested and found to operate system disregards the presence of water particles
without any error for detecting ice buildup. The between the sensor probes. So rain water particles
system does not have any effect on its operation flowing over wing surfaces is completely ignored.
due to flow of air and air pressure through airplane This feature gives an extra advantage over some
wing surface. Also there is no capacitive effect on other systems used on many aircrafts today as the
the sensor because of its small sized probes. So the chance of erroneous sensing is avoided.
system’s measurement of ice thickness stays linear.
When temperature of water at freezing point, the
system sends signal for ice detection. Also this
signal is used for repelling the ionizing
contaminants from the sensor probes for cleaning.
The DSP system generates information about
thickness of ice buildup on wing surface and the
computer system computes the thickness. System
simulates notification to the airplane crew’s display
Also the system is activates deicing system in the
wing when it detects ice thickness reaching the
critical threshold.
7. FUTURE ADVANCEMENTS
First, we need to place this system on commercial
airplane wing surface. The probes in this case
should be made with durable graphite or other
electrically conductive material like carbon fiber
materials. Then test the system during actual flight
and also on ground in very cold weather.
This system can be improved for future high-speed
avionic transports where space flights will be
initiated. The wing concepts are different with
smaller wing areas to obtain high-speed transports
in future. For such transports at low altitude below
25000 feet, it will become absolutely crucial to
achieve precision system for deicing. Sensors must
be designed smaller and their materials should be
very strong to withstand high pressure and
temperature. Today’s technologies for military
combat airplanes are already implementing such
smaller wing concepts for achieving high-speed.
Deicing technology for such aircrafts can be
developed using this design concept.
To increase airplane safety standards, a number of
ice sensors can be placed on known areas of each
wing where ice accumulation occurs. This way the
accuracy of the deicing system can also be
increased. To improve airplane’s technical
standards, this new approach will apply less
number of wires for sensors. This will implement a
logical array technique that can allow very less
number of wiring harnesses needed for these
sensors. An algorithm for such mixed signal
technique is currently being investigated and a
suitable design approach of a control circuitry is
under consideration for future deicing system.
Other design considerations include redesign of
sensors where they can be very small. Currently a
design idea is being implemented where the sensor
probes will be 0.06 inch thick and also they will be
less than 0.25 inch long. These sensor probes will
be tested on airplane when ready. For its smaller
resistive surface area and thus reduced
conductance, it becomes an ultra-low power sensor.
Also it can easily be mounted and replaced on the
wing surfaces at multiple locations.
As the system uses very low power sensor, it may
suffer from induced noise and capacitance due to
long wires running in the wing from the deicing
system to the sensor during a real flight. The future
high-speed transports can have low power
embedded circuitry on sensor probe module on
wing surface and thus cancel the effects of induced
noises. This approach can also increase the
bandwidth for high-speed signal generation
between the sensor and the deicing system.
7. CONCLUSION
Design of localized sensor is implemented for
airplane deicing system that can detect icing
conditions accurately. The results from the
experiments verify that this deicing system can help
avoid the critical icing accumulation causing
impairment of military, aerospace missions and
commercial flights. The results found from the
experiments also show that the sensor is very linear
with the thickness of ice and it was 12.267mV per
0.01 inch of ice thickness. The sensor principle and
circuitry is described here. Also the block diagram
and the logical flow of the system are presented
here. The advantages and disadvantages of the
system are discussed here. The improvements
including implementation of smaller, very sensitive,
0.06-inch thick and 0.25-inch long ice sensors for
the future flights of military, space and commercial
flights are also discussed.
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1. Lightfoot, F.M. and Milligan, R.E., (1997),
Aircraft Ice Accretion Measurement: A Phase
I, SBIR Study Using Millimeter Wave Radar
(MMWR), IEEE AES Systems Magazine,
August, pp. 3-9.
2. Valarezo, W.O. (1993), Aerodynamic
Performance Effects due to Small Leading-
Edge Ice (Roughness) on Wings and Tails,
Journal of Aircraft, November-December,
30(6).
3. Federal Aviation and Aeronautics, (1992),
Aircraft Ice Detectors Related Technologies for
Onground and Inflight Applications, FAA,
New Jersey, USA.
4. Binzaid, S. and Biney, P.O. (1994),
Development of Snow/Ice Detector for
Airplane Wing Surface, E&A Proceedings,
Texas, USA, (2), pp. 577-581.
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Aerospace Thermal Systems.