Aircraft icing detector

摘要

A system capable of detecting the hazardous accumulation of ice on the surfaces, engines, instruments and air intakes of aircrafts or other objects of interest. The system consists of an electromagnetic microwave resonator capable of detecting the formation of ice directly where it could cause problems. The sensor could be mounted around the air intake of pitot tubes, static ports, engines intake, engines core, and can be embedded in the aircraft skin. The system uses algorithms based on the variations of the complex dielectric permittivity of water substance with frequency to distinguish the various types of ice from each other and from water.

主权项

1. A system for detecting ice formation on aircrafts comprising:
an electromagnetic resonator operating at microwave frequencies; and a data processing unit with non-transitory software implementing an algorithm to detect at least one of the presence of ice, ice type and ice thickness and output at least one of a warning and an alert, the algorithm including:
a) measuring resonance frequencies (fi) and associated quality factors (Qd) using distribution of power of a transmitted signal (S21) of said electromagnetic resonator;b) determining power of a transmitted signal associated with said reasonance frequencies;c) using analytical expressions or lookup tables to determine a real part of a complex dielectric permittivity (ε′) at each of said resonance frequencies based on said resonance frequencies (fi), associated quality factors (Qd), and distribution of power of said transmitted signal (S21);d) using analytical expressions or lookup tables to determine an imaginary part of said complex dielectric permittivity (ε″) at each of said resonance frequencies and a thickness of a layer of water or ice based on said resonance frequencies (fi), associated quality factors (Qd), and distribution of power of said transmitted signal (S21); ande) using analytical expressions or lookup tables to refine the calculations and confirm or refute the presence of water or ice.