Systems and methods for icing flight tests
AssigneeThe Boeing Company
InventorsChris Bosetti, Fred Norman Krueger, Ian Miles Gunter, Dean Walters
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Systems and methods for the manufacture and use of artificial ice shapes for aircraft certification, including methods of manufacturing artificial ice shapes, artificial ice component systems for attachment to aircraft, methods of flight testing aircraft having artificial ice sections attached thereto, and artificial ice testing systems.
Claims20
A method of evaluating an aircraft's performance under icing conditions, comprising:
- creating a set of artificial ice sections, the ice sections being configured for sequential adjacent attachment to a surface of an aircraft to form an artificial ice component that simulates ice accretion, each ice section being marked to indicate a specific mounting location relative to other ice sections in the set;
- attaching the set of artificial ice sections to the surface of the aircraft via a double-sided adhesive system;
- flight testing the aircraft to evaluate the aircraft's performance;
- and
- removing the ice sections from the aircraft by disrupting the adhesive system.
A method of preparing an aircraft for evaluating its performance under icing conditions, comprising:
- designing an artificial ice component having an inner surface contoured to complement a selected aircraft surface, and an outer surface contoured to simulate ice accretion;
- manufacturing the artificial ice component;
- and
- installing the component on the selected aircraft surface.
A method of modifying a vehicle using an artificial environmental accretion, comprising:
- designing an artificial environmental accretion component having an inner surface contoured to complement a selected vehicle surface, and an outer surface contoured to simulate a selected environmental accretion;
- manufacturing the artificial environmental accretion component;
- and
- installing the component on the selected vehicle surface.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.