An Experimental Study on the Surface De-Icing of FRP Plates via the External Hot-Air Method

In cold and humid climate conditions, the surface of wind turbine blades is prone to icing. Effective de-icing methods have attracted widespread attention from scholars around the world. In this study, an external hot-air de-icing test system was designed and constructed. A test program for FRP plate surface de-icing was formulated. The main parameters of the experiment included hot-air temperature (25~55 °C), hot-air speed (7~13 m/s), the jet distance between the outlet of the hot-air pipe and the ice surface (100~400 mm), the pipe inner diameter of the de-icing device air outlet (50 mm, 63 mm, 90 mm), and different jet times. Critical data on the de-icing mass, energy consumption, and energy efficiency were obtained. The experimental results showed that the external hot-air method could be used for FRP plate surface de-icing. Under the conditions of this experiment, the lowest de-icing energy consumption and the highest de-icing energy efficiency of 21.1 kJ/g and 4.95% were achieved when the hot-air temperature was 55 °C and hot-air speed was 13 m/s.