Numerical Simulation of In-Flight Iced Surface Roughness
Abstract
CFD is a primary tool used to assess the in-flight effects of atmospheric icing on
aircraft. In-flight ice accretion codes use CFD computed quantities, such as shear
stress and heat transfer, to predict ice shape formation over rough surfaces. The
equivalent sandgrain roughness approach is the model commonly used in icing
codes for the prediction of skin friction and heat fluxes over iced surfaces.
Additional turbulent Prandtl number corrections can be added to the Reynolds
Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations turbulence model to refine the heat
transfer. Still, uncertainties persist in identifying the roughness parameters to
input into the thermal correction, leaving the characterization of rough surfaces
incomplete in terms of research. This chapter develops a methodology for the
estimation of roughness input parameters based on the observation of experimental
ice accretion. Metamodeling involving Polynomial Chaos Expansion (PCE)
and calibration with a Bayesian inversion are employed. The methodology is
applied to a NACA0012 airfoil, yielding a glaze ice cross-sectional area and
maximum thickness with less than a 6% error from experiments. The approach
opens perspectives for the estimation of appropriate case-dependent roughness
parameters for RANS-based ice shape predictions.