Research on the influence of icing on the lip of the aero engine nacelle

Aero-engine nacelle lip icing poses a significant threat to engine safety. Understanding the icing characteristics on the nacelle lip surface provides a crucial basis for analyzing icing hazards and designing protective measures. This study focuses on a self-designed nacelle model, employing a combination of numerical simulations and ice wind tunnel experiments to systematically analyze the icing characteristics and influencing factors on the nacelle lip surface. The findings show that an increase in intake airflow and a decrease in incoming airflow speed result in a reduction of the actual airflow attack angle at the lip, which in turn reduces the ice coverage on the inner surface and increases the ice coverage on the outer surface. As the incoming temperature and droplet diameter decrease, the ice coverage on both the inner and outer surfaces of the nacelle decreases, while the ice thickness increases with lower temperatures but decreases with smaller droplet diameters. The droplet diameter has a minor effect on ice thickness. Furthermore, sensitivity analysis of the average ice thickness for different parameters indicates that the droplet size has the most significant impact on nacelle lip icing, followed by intake airflow, incoming wind speed, and incoming temperature. The results of this study provide important theoretical support for the research on icing mechanisms and the design of anti-icing measures for aircraft engine nacelle.