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June 16, 1998
John Bluck
NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
(Phone: 650/604-5026 or 604-9000)
email: jbluck@mail.arc.nasa.gov
RELEASE: 98-37AR
NASA LIGHTWEIGHT 'ICE ZAPPER' TO BE USED ON NEW AIRCRAFT
An innovative NASA ice removal system will be included with the first new general aviation aircraft to be introduced in the United States in 15 years. The lightweight, patented device will zap dangerous ice from wings and other aircraft parts during flight.
Lancair Inc., Bend, OR, will test the ice removal system with its Lancair IV aircraft and make the system available later this summer with the new Columbia 300, a four-seat, general aviation airplane. Even in warm climates, aircraft icing can be a problem at higher altitudes where temperatures are cold.
In 1995, NASA licensed the ice zapper, officially known as the Electro-Expulsive Separation System, to Ice Management Systems, Inc., Temecula, CA, for development and marketing. Ice Management recently agreed to develop the system for Lancair aircraft. The ice zapper could help NASA meet its goal of greatly improving commercial aircraft safety.
Click here to reach preview and PUBLICATION SIZE images in AP Leaf Desk format minus embedded captions. "The ice zapper uses one-thousandth the power and is one-tenth the weight of electro-thermal ice removal systems used today," said inventor Leonard Haslim of NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA. "The system pulverizes ice into small particles and removes layers of ice as thin as frost or as thick as an inch of glaze."
Haslim, a Naval jet fighter pilot during the Korean conflict, continues to be concerned with flying safety. He holds numerous patents, and he won NASA's inventor of the year award in 1988 for the Electro-Expulsive Separation System, which he also calls the "ice zapper."
"The Lancair IV aircraft, which cruises above 18,000 feet at 345 mph, is the perfect first candidate for this unique, new de-icing system, and this program complements our goal of enhancing safety and increasing the utility of our aircraft," said Lancair president Lance Neibauer.
"I think that once it is working on a small aircraft, engineers will realize the system will work well with larger airplanes too," Haslim said.
There are other methods to combat airframe icing, including thermal de-icing and pneumatic boots. "Thermal de-icers that melt ice use a lot of energy," Haslim said. "Also, melted ice can re-freeze elsewhere on the aircraft, or larger loose ice shards can fly into the aircraft to cause damage."
Pneumatic boots inflate slowly and need as much as a quarter inch of ice to accumulate before they start to work. They also dislodge bigger ice pieces that can damage aircraft engines, according to Haslim. "In one winter alone, 26 F/A-18 engines were damaged by ice chunks hitting engine fan blades," he said.
"The system uses a powerful electronic photoflash-like power supply combined with a thin copper ribbon that looks like a belt flattened on itself and embedded in a rubbery plastic," he said. "The looped, flattened copper ribbons are bonded to wings, engine inlets and other airplane parts where ice can form."
In less than a millisecond, the system sends bursts of high-current electricity through the two parallel layers of copper ribbon. The resultant magnetic fields suddenly repel each other. The upper ribbon jumps less than twenty-thousandth of an inch causing a high acceleration. The motion breaks the ice bond, shatters the ice into table-salt-size particles and expels them from the airplane's surface. The system can run continually during flight, pulsing once or twice a minute, to keep airplane surfaces ice free. The system's overlapping copper ribbon prevents electrical interference.
The task of converting the Electro-Expulsive Separation System patent into a commercial product has taken nearly four years and almost $1,000,000, according to Richard Olson, president and chief operating officer of Ice Management.
NASA neither verifies product claims nor endorses commercial offerings. To learn more about NASA innovations, commercialization efforts and the agency's technology transfer programs, interested parties can call 1-800-678-6882 or access the NASA Commercial Technology Network web page at URL:
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