A Comprehensive Approach to Icing Certification

During the certification of an airplane, the chances of encountering icing conditions as defined in the Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR) are so small that the satisfactory performance of an anti-icing system has to be established by methods other than flight tests in FAR icing conditions. The regulations, however, do not specify a set of standard procedures for evaluating the anti-icing capability of a system. The methods used within the industry, therefore, vary very widely in type, scope, and accuracy.

This paper describes an approach used by Gates Learjet that is simple and inexpensive to be within the reach of any manufacturer, and accurate enough to contribute towards the creation of a standard procedure within the whole industry.